Born to be King
by CosmicKitten89
Summary: Young genius Ludwig von Koopa has a brilliant childhood with his loving mother and crazy great-uncle in real world Vienna. However, when he is introduced to his father in Dark Land, he must come to terms with his heritage and learn many lessons that cannot be taught at university. Story cover courtesy of EdieMammon/Treacle Parcheesi
1. In Austria and Dark Land

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. Some of the ideas for this story can be credited to my sister.

In a manor in a gated community in real world Vienna, Austria, a plump blue-haired dragon-Koopa woman with an air of sophistication was playing a melody that she had composed on the piano with an expectant expression on her face.

All of a sudden, her uncle, a skinny old dragon-Koopa with crazy hair, a lab coat and swirly goggles, ran out of the basement roaring in excitement.

"Sofia, I have found your perfect match!"

Sofia had given her uncle Wolfgang a sample of her DNA for him to match up to other dragon-Koopas in his database so that he could determine who would be most likely to produce a genius child with her.

"Who is it? I certainly hope it is nobility."

"Even better. I matched you with royalty!"

"Royalty?" Sofia's smile faltered. "Um, you wouldn't happen to know of any Koopa royals other than-"

"The one and only!" Wolfgang giggled hysterically, his body twitching almost involuntarily. "King Bowser Koopa of Dark Land!"

Sofia moaned. "Not that idiot! There is no way that he is good stock for fathering genius children!"

"Sofia, he's not an idiot! He just… erm… lacks common sense. But as far as technical matters are concerned, he is actually quite intelligent. He has designed some state-of-the-art security systems for all of the real-estate he owns. Your child will likely make a great engineer or scientist!"

"Wolfgang, I want my child to be a Mozart, not an Einstein…"

"Your child will quite likely be both."

"Well certainly there is a better match than a king who doesn't have the sense not to hire a plumber that harasses him and destroys his property and physically injures him. Have you checked the noble Koopa bloodlines of Austria?"

"Yes, I have, and trust me, that would be inbreeding. We have been inbred for quite a few generations, and if we continue to do so our lineage will be destroyed! Your best hope for a brilliant, healthy child is to outbreed. Besides, wouldn't you like your child to be royalty?"

"That clown of a king can hardly be defined as such."

"Which is all the more reason to introduce our bloodline to theirs! King Koopa has not yet borne a child, so if you get to him first, it will be your brilliant, cultured child that will be heir to the throne! What could possibly be better for the kingdom?"

Sofia sighed and stared at the statue of Ludwig van Beethoven that was perched on her piano. "I don't know… I would rather not be married to such a man…"

"Genetics don't lie, my niece. And who says you would have to be married to him for an extended period of time? Just lay his egg and ditch him. He probably won't notice you're gone, what with the humongous harem he is looking to build up…"

"All right. But how do I get to him?"

"Rumor has it he is looking for mail-order brides. Considering your refined heritage, he will likely find you to be a good match for bearing his first child."

...

King Bowser was pacing back and forth while Kamek consulted his crystal ball.

"Kamek, hurry up and find me my perfect match!" Bowser roared.

"Calm Your Highness's temper, it takes a while to search for the mate with the best astrological profile for bearing a King, or Queen as it may be."

Bowser snorted and jumped onto his bed, which made Kamek's crystal ball rattle.

"Hmmm… Oh, there is this woman who has just put herself up as a mail-order bride. And, when matched up against your natal chart, hers shows that you two are a perfect match! At least as far as childbearing is concerned."

"What about as far as being a good wife is concerned?"

"Umm… Kamek hurriedly waved his hands over the crystal ball. "That doesn't matter. Just mail-order her, right now! The conception must be timed precisely if you want to bear a child that is most fit to be heir to the throne! And that perfect time comes in less than a year, which gives you only a month to order her and make her conceive your child!"

"But I want a good wife, dammit!" Bowser roared.

"You can divorce her, take her child, and then worry about getting a good wife! You do want the perfect heir, don't you?"

"Grrr… OK… I demand that you order her!"

"R-right away, Sire."


	2. Here Comes The Bride

"Curse you, Marius and Ludwig!"

Bowser had just been kicked into the lava by a pair of German plumbers that he had called upon to fix the many pipes in his castle. He was always getting these two to fix his constant plumbing problems, even though they were The brothers, who wore white shirts, red (in Marius's case) and green (in Ludwig's case) lederhosen, and hats with swastikas on them to match their Hitler-style mustaches (**yup, they are German stereotypes, just as Mario and Luigi are Italian stereotypes xD**) gave each other a high-five and hopped down the nearest pipe.

"Why – the hell – are they always trying to beat me up, those damn Nazi wannabes!"

"Sire, your mail-order bride has arrived."

Kamek helped Bowser to haul himself out of the lava. Bowser took the lift to the bottom floor of the castle.

"Greetings, Your Highness. My name is Sofia von Shellz, and I believe that I am the bride that you ordered."

Bowser was immediately turned off by her accent.

"GRAAAWR! NOT ANOTHER GERMAN!"

"Your Highness, I am actually Austrian," Sofia said.

"Pardon him," said Kamek. "He has been given quite a bit of trouble by a pair of plumbers of the German persuasion. And if you ask me, I don't think they are really even German."

"Well, King Koopa, if I may call you that-"

"Please, call me Bowser."

"Bowser, then. Would you happen to have a fine concert piano for me to play?"

"Nope."

"A violin?"

"Are you kidding?"

"Any sort of musical instrument?"

"Well instruments of torture can be pretty musical…"

Sofia sighed. _Every bit as uncultured as I thought_.

Kamek whispered to Bowser. "You need to do it tonight. Your child has to be born on August the thirteenth (**Koji Kondo's birthday; he's the guy who composed the score for a lot of the Mario games**) if you desire a child with the perfect horoscope to be ruler."

Bowser grunted. "What if she doesn't come on that quick?"

"Charm her. Try to show some culture. Buy her a concert piano."

Bowser cleared his throat. "Ahem… how about I, uh, buy you the finest concert piano that money can buy?"

Sofia said, "Well unless it's made of gold, it's unlikely to be finer than the one I have back in Vienna."

"No worries, madam. I will have it here for the wedding tonight."

"We are getting married tonight?"

"Why, certainly, dear. I have been planning the wedding, with your tastes in mind, since I saw your beautiful face up on the list for mail order."

Bowser pulled Sofia around and kissed her cheek.

"Now I shall escort you to my finest guest bedroom while I get things organized."

Sofia pouted as she rested under the fine silky linen. _Shouldn't the woman plan the wedding? _

"TROOPS! I NEED YOU ALL TO ORGANIZE A FANCY AUSTRIAN-STYLE WEDDING HERE IN MY PALACE'S BALLROOM, AND I NEED IT TO HAPPEN TONIGHT!"

Kamek started giving orders to everyone. The kitchen staff got to work baking a gigantic cake. Bowser roared and breathed fire out of stress whenever one of his troops approached him. Sofia was only allowed out of the room to have her hair and makeup done and to be fitted for a wedding dress that Bowser had picked out for her.

Bowser paced laps through the castle, shouting at his henchmen to do a better job at whatever they were doing.

"MORE ICING ON THAT CAKE!"

"YOU CALL THAT A CLASSICAL MUSIC ARRANGEMENT?"

"ARE THESE ROSES IMPORTED? MY SOFIA WANTS IMPORTED ROSES!"

"THAT DIAMOND ISN'T BIG ENOUGH!"

"THAT VINTAGE CHAMPAGNE ISN'T VINTAGE ENOUGH!"

"Sire…"

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT?" Bowser nearly blew Kamek's cap off with his fiery rage.

"Um, preparations are going well, except we are missing a few things…

"You see, we need a flower girl, and a ring bearer…"

Bowser grabbed a Paratroopa and a Paragoomba that were hanging up wedding banners.

"He shall be the ring bearer and she shall be the flower girl."

"Uumm, sir, this Paratroopa's a boy."

Bowser ripped a pink bow off of one of the decorative banners and put it on the Paratroopa's head. "Now he's a girl."

"A-and there is one more thing that we will be having an issue with getting... deep breaths, sire… the golden piano."

Bowser drew a deep breath and swallowed the fire that had formed in his throat. "And why would that be?"

"Sire, the only solid gold concert piano that I know of is owned by the crown of the Mushroom Kingdom."

"Well we will just have to steal it!"

"B-but Sire, couldn't we just borrow it? It would be imprudent of you to create cause for any enmity between Dark Land and the Mushroom Kingdom."

"Whatever. I will be conquering their asses someday anyway. Borrow it, but don't return it. It shall be a wedding gift for my dear Sofia."

"Yes Sire."

"What is taking so LONG!" Bowser roared an hour later. "I cannot start this wedding without that piano!"

"We got it, Sire! We had to empty out half the treasury just to borrow it for tonight, but we got it!"

Kamek cleared a space for the Magikoopas to set the piano down.

Even Bowser was impressed by the sheer magnificence of the solid 24 carat gold instrument. He rubbed his claws over it, lightly so as not to scratch it, and he could feel how soft the pure gold was.

"You can play that fancy song that they always play at the start of a wedding, can't you?"

"Pachelbel's Canon, Sire. And yes." Kamek hopped onto the piano and immediately began playing.

"Aah, yes, that piano sounds as good as it looks!" Bowser hummed off-key to the music. "And you do remember to play 'Here Comes The Bride' when she walks down the aisle, and that other song after we kiss-"

"The Wedding March, Sire. And yes, I know how to do a wedding. I played for your parents'."

Bowser banged on the bride's door. "HURRY UP, MY BRIDE! TIME TO DO THE WEDDING!"

Sofia grudgingly exited the room in her dress, holding a bouquet, with her hair and makeup done, but hidden under the veil.

Bowser tried to remove the veil but Sofia slapped him.

As soon as Sofia was visible, Kamek began to play "Here Comes The Bride". Sofia ogled the piano, impressed that the oaf she was marrying actually came through for her. When they reached the end of the aisle, Kamek went to the front to read off the vows.

The Paragoomba came with the ring, which also impressed Sofia. It was a brilliant-cut diamond bigger than her eyeball.

"Yeah, yeah yeah yeah, I do," said Bowser.

"I do," said Sofia, biting her tongue the moment afterwards.

They kissed, neither one quite so impressed with the other's kissing skills, and Kamek flew back to the piano to play "The Wedding March".

"You are now Queen Consort Sofia Koopa," declared Bowser.

"Queen Consort Sofia VON Koopa," Sofia corrected.

"By the way, that piano is yours. Oh, and if any repo men come to take it, don't let them, they're just fakes who are trying to steal it."

"I would like to sample the cake now, if you don't mind," said Sofia, her tone indicating an attitude of snobbish European disdain for other countries' desserts.

"OK, my dear, I shall find you a plate now-"

The cake exploded. Two figures dressed in raccoon shoots leaping out were the cause.

"DAMN THEM!" Bowser shouted.

Marius and Ludwig began stomping on the Goombas and kicking Koopa shells around.

Sofia turned hot with rage.

"NOBODY CRASHES MY WEDDING!"

Sofia shouted German swears at them, burnt their raccoon suits off with her fire breath, grabbed their heads and banged them together, and tossed them into the lava.

"Sorry about them," Bowser said sheepishly.

"Well I don't think they will be bothering us again. Not a bad cake, considering it wasn't made out of fresh, raw, organic ingredients."

Kamek tugged at the sleeve of Bowser's tux. "Right now," he mouthed to them.

"Um, okay, how about we go to bed now?"

"What, no slow-dancing?"

"What, you want to dance in a ballroom with cake splattered everywhere? We can dance later after the henchmen clean it up."

Bowser stared into the small pupils of Sofia's large eyes.

"Sofia, do you find me… handsome?"

"Um… yes," Sofia said out of politeness, admitting to herself that she actually did find him to be rather handsome. "But as far as I am concerned, it is what is on the inside that counts."

"Well, believe me, there is plenty of goodness on the inside as well," Bowser said, winking and growling. "Now let's go to bed."

"Wait, what's with the hurry to get me in the bed?"

"Umm…" Bowser did not want to tell her the real reason; that he was doing so on an astrologer's recommendation, lest she scoff at him for being superstitious.

"It's a longstanding Koopa family tradition to sleep with each other within an hour of marriage."

"Well, if you insist…" Sofia sighed. _Might as well get it over with…_


	3. Egg

Sofia tenderly caressed her egg. It was so perfect, all shiny, a glossy deep royal blue. She couldn't wait to get it back to Austria so that she could have Wolfgang x-ray it so that she could watch its development and find out right away whether it was a boy or a girl.

_If it's a boy, I will name him Ludwig, after Ludwig van Beethoven, _she thought_. If it's a girl, I will name her Maria Anna after Mozart's sister._

Bowser was currently planning a wedding for the next wife he was adding to his harem. This new wife, Clawdia, was not nearly as sophisticated as Sofia, and was constantly nagging him on how she wanted the wedding to be.

_He deserves her,_ she thought.

While Bowser was being chewed out by Clawdia, Sofia carried the egg against her bosom and fled the castle to the nearest KoopAir station.

Bowser only noticed that Sofia was gone when he went to her room to make her dress up in a bridesmaid outfit.

"WHAT? WHERE DID SHE GO? AND WHERE'S THE EGG?"

Kamek tapped on Bowser's shell. "Um, sire…"

Bowser turned around and grabbed Kamek's neck. "HOW COULD YOU LET HER ESCAPE?"

Kamek gagged, and Bowser loosened his grip on his neck. "There is one thing about the child's horoscope… it will be more favorable if the child hatches in Austria."

Bowser sighed. "Well, once the child hatches, the kid is MINE!"

"You will win the custody battle, sire, what with your resources and power," said Kamek.

"If it's a boy, I am naming the kid Bowser Jr., just like his old dad."

"And if it's a girl?"

"I think Kootie Pie would be a good name for a darling little girl."

Meanwhile, Sofia was in Austria, watching Wolfgang with caution as he x-rayed her precious egg.

Wolfgang giggled as he observed the embryo. "Haha, only a week old, yes? Look at the brain!"

Sofia looked at the lump at the part of the shrimpy-looking embryo that appeared to be its budding head.

"It's remarkably well-developed for its age!" shouted Wolfgang.

Sofia nodded. "OK…"

Wolfgang ran around laughing like crazy. "This kid's going to be a prodigy! A scientific mastermind before it even knows how to talk!"

"And a musical genius, yes?"

"Yeah, sure, the kid's pretty much going to be a prodigy at everything."

"_Onkel_, would you mind telling me whether my child is a boy or a girl?"

"Alas, it is too soon to tell that… without a DNA test, that is!"

Wolfgang got out a syringe with an ultrafine needle and, laughing and shaking, began to inject it into the egg.

"Be careful, I don't want you to break the eggshell… don't poke his brain!"

Wolfgang syringed out a sample of the albumen and placed it on a microscopic slide. He put it to his high-power microscope and searched for a cell whose DNA was arranged in chromosomes for one of the phases of mitosis.

"Alright, just have to burst the cell open and get the chromosomes to spread out so we can see what's what… what's this, an extra chromosome?"

Sofia gasped, afraid her child would have Down syndrome, but Wolfgang just laughed.

"Just kidding. OK, we got all the chromosomes here, none of them are damaged, and this one looks like a Y – yup, you're having a baby boy."

"Ludwig!" Sofia hugged the egg she had now named Ludwig.

"Great name! Ludwig after the scientist Ludwig von Boltzmann!"

"No, Ludwig after Ludwig van Beethoven!"

"Beethoven! What did he ever do other than write silly little melodies! Boltzmann formulated the Boltzmann constant, which is crucial for the study of thermodynamics!"

"If you think that Beethoven's work is nothing more than silly little melodies, then you have no appreciation for culture!"

"Well, how about we let the child decide, then?"

Sofia took the egg and placed it in the bedroom she had set up for the child. Ludwig already had a crib and fine paintings of famous musicians hung up in his room. Sofia now knew what color blankets to get him.

She placed the egg in the crib, put a Mozart CD into a CD player and put the headphones on the egg.


	4. Hatching

**Ludwig's POV**

_Musik._

Various melodies pulse through existence, their continuity broken only by the unmelodic sounds that tag themselves to the melodies…

Beethoven…

Mozart…

Handel…

Haydn…

Bach…

Tchaikovsky (a tag that is not quite in harmony with the others, for unknown reasons)…

And many others…

What a beautiful existence. How fortunate that this is all that exists, nothing that is not beautiful, or not pleasant…

For there are other tags, other sounds that, as vague as they are, foretell of a chilling other existence…

There is a voice – of sorts, but not exactly a sound so much as a… meaning… that also pulses through existence, that explains and labels these other sounds…

Each comes in a different voice. There is the rough, unstable tenor of the voice labeled as _Onkel _Wolfgang, Wolfgang or sometimes just _Onkel._

There are other sounds, heard less often, such as those labeled as Wilhelm and Josephine…

And there is the sound heard most often of all, the one labeled as Sofia and also as_ Mutter_.

_Mutter_. The non-voice of meaning has not explained what exactly this is. Anyway, the voice of _Mutter_ is constantly repeating the same sound.

_Ludwig._

It is a tag, but the non-voice of meaning does not explain what is tagged as such. It is not a bother at first, but though everything is explained as time passes, often almost as soon as the sound pops into existence,_ Ludwig_ continues to evade explanation.

The non-voice of meaning becomes the non-sound of a storm. The failure to define_ Ludwig_ in due time makes for a most unpleasant discord. The non-voice of meaning is not so omniscient after all.

The storm is bothersome. Why can existence no longer be a peaceful nothingness but music?

Another disturbance slowly begins to creep its way into existence. It is not dissonance, but discomfort. Before, there was only sound. There was no… form.

All existence is now explained, by the increasingly agitated non-voice of meaning, as a body encased in a shell. The sound labels are becoming increasingly clear. Although they all come from outside the shell…

This cannot continue any longer. The shell needs to be removed. The non-voice of meaning is torn between resistance to existence outside the shell and an imploring need to seek further meaning out there. The pressure of the shell on the body is becoming tighter and tighter, until the shell breaks against the body.

Although it could just as easily be said that the body pressed against and broke the shell.

The medium that sound once traversed falls away as a viscous residue, replaced by a more rarified medium that burns the more tender parts of this body. Sound is somehow clearer, sharper, almost painful.

_Pain_. The non-voice of meaning now attaches this label to the unpleasantness that the dissonant voices foretold of…

But most shocking of all is the sudden burst of brightness, sort of a music of another sense, except that it sometimes lacked in the dimension of time but showed enough dimensions to express _form_…

_Sight._

So much was explained…

The voice that was labeled as _Mutter_ was coming from a larger form, the first form that had become visible since the destruction of the shell. The voice was familiar, and almost as pleasant as the melodies that had once echoed through the egg.

"_Ludwig. Mein Sohn_."

Appendages of a sharp, angular form appeared. They were similar to the ones attached to _Mutter,_ but they were instead attached to the locus of all perception, close to where the non-sound of meaning resonated from…

"_Ich bin deine Mutter. Du bist mein Sohn."_

This form that holds the voice of Sofia is my mother. And I… _I_… am her_ son._

_I... Me I am Ludwig._

Seeing the body that was me, or part of me anyway, and that it was just another one like _Mutter's_, just one of many…

Others that were not part of my consciousness… were they of another consciousness? Did another consciousness actually exist?

The blinding light of the outside had shocked me into my sense of self. A sharper more alert state of being than the vague dreaminess of life inside the shell, in which so little existed and so little mattered…

But the non-voice of meaning continued to grow, until it… _I_… felt constrained by the limitations around it.

The non-voice of meaning, which I now realized was my mind, was glad to be out. _ I_ was glad to be out. Scared, but it was a fear I could live with.

_Mutter _put her appendages around me – her arms – and embraced me somewhat tightly, as the egg had, but it felt pleasant rather than constraining. My mind pulsing with the compulsive urge to mimic, I embraced her back.

_Mutter_ then placed my body next to a larger object that I instinctively thought was beautiful. The body of the object was dark, sort of a non-sight, but it shone with a gloss of light that contradicted its inherent darkness.

_Beautiful. _

Rows of dark and light, dark and light, a contrast that made me giddy as I looked at it.

_Beautiful._

I tried to say the word, but I was not yet trained in how to make these sounds that my _Mutter_ was able to make. I watched, wide-eyed, as she began to touch the dark and light to create what I found most beautiful of all.

It was a melody that was familiar to me, only ever so much clearer without the sound-obstructing shell around me! I made crude vocalizations and made sound by hitting my hands together. My mind absorbed every note, every detail, every key, which key corresponded to which note.

I begin to press the keys myself – it doesn't sound quite as good, due to my limited motor coordination; the timing and some of the notes are off. I feel… _ashamed_.

_Mutter_ gently grabs my hands and helps me to place my fingers in the right positions. I grab my hands away and feverishly bang on the piano some more. My limbs feel so unwieldy, but I am determined to get it right.

I practice a few times, my coordination getting better with each try. At long last, I play it perfectly.

Mutter embraces me again, expressing pride and admiration at what I had done and calling me a _Wunderkind_. The entire while, I am constructing a song that I have never heard before in my mind.

I look forward to the future of my life outside the shell. Pains, pleasures, I shall embrace it all!


	5. Story Time

**YES! I'm in the mood to do another chapter AT LAST! =) I'm writing this at school, it's the first time I've written a chap in school since – well, last semester. InvaderFiction wrote her own version of this story taking off after last chapter, so be sure to check hers out too! =)**

"_Est is Zeit, Klavier zu __ü__ben, mein lieber Sohn."_

Sofia began to touch the piano keys, hoping that Ludwig would hear the incomplete melody and be overcome by aesthetic urge to finish it. She did not hear the explosion from the laboratory downstairs in the cellar.

Wolfgang and Ludwig were laughing, their scales singed and scratched by Erlenmeyer flask shrapnel. Ludwig was holding a ray gun in one hand and a jar with a preserved brain in it in the other.

Still laughing and twitching, Wolfgang pointed to another flask in his hand, but Ludwig shook his head and pointed it at the brain.

Wolfgang fell into another orgasmic spasm of giggles and took the brain to hold it up for Ludwig to take aim at.

Ludwig fired the laser and held it at the brain for about a minute, giggling the entire time.

"Onkel, the laser isn't hot enough! Add sodium bicarbonate and then it will REALLY EXPLODE!"

Wolfgang nearly exploded himself, struggling through his fit of laughter to reach the cabinet and get the box of baking soda out. He opened the jar to pour it in, and the fluid bubbled up viciously from the heat and laser stimulation…

Sofia's father Wilhelm von Shellz hit a sour note on his violin.

"_Gott verdammt! _JOSEPHINE!"

Sofia's mother perked up from the book she was reading.

"Stop that _verdammt_ brother of yours before he causes our house to go Hindenburg on us!"

Josephine Brunsvik von Shellz went downstairs and found her brother firing the laser at Ludwig's head.

"I wonder how long it will take for my brain to explode!" Ludwig cried. "Ooh that tickles! TURN IT UP!"

"WOLFGANG AMADEUS VON BACHSTEIN!" Josephine screeched.

"Haha, hey sis! Look at what Ludwig here built! A handheld carbon dioxide laser, isn't that impressive? Even I couldn't have built that when I was one year old!

"And you're aiming it at his HEAD?"

"It's not going to hurt him! It takes a long time for it to just make a brain explode!"

Josephine gasped. "Wolfgang Amadeus von Bachstein, have you been making shrapnel out of my brains again?"

"It was nobody important…"

Josephine began to rant at her brother for endangering her grandson. Ludwig sighed and clumbed up the stairs to exit the cellar. _Maybe I better go practice the piano,_ he thought.

**Ludwig's POV**

I spend a very pleasant afternoon hour mastering Chopin's Fantazie Impromptu. My mother hugs and kisses me when I finish.

"Oh, my precious Ludwig, you will be the youngest person ever to win the International Chopin Piano Competition!"

"Yeah, or the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Prize!"

"Ludwig…"

"Hey, why not both!" I turn the page of the sheet music book and immediately begin to practicing a new song.

"Ludwig, you are done with practice for today…"

"I know." I turn the page and continue with the song.

"Ludwig, wouldn't now be a nice time for a story?"

I hate it when my concentration is riveted and people INSIST on tearing it. Oh well, clearly _Mutter_ is not going to leave me alone about it, and it's not like anybody else in the world is going to steal my future title.

_Mutter_ takes me into her velvet-cushioned rocking chair and picks a book off the coffee table. Hm, she already had a book picked out…

I try to grab the book but _Mutter_ will not permit me.

"_Mutter_, you know that I read my books on my own!" I protest.

"Ludwig, please! Allow me to read to you just once." Her face, I now notice, is somewhat damp. "My son is growing up so fast…"

I submit to her insistence on treating me as though I were a small child, for her benefit if not for mine.

It was titled _Der M__ä__rchenk__ö__nig_. A fairy tale king? Seriously, she could have at least picked out a stimulating historical novel to read to me…

"_Mutter,_ you know that I dislike fairy tales!" I protest.

"This isn't a fairy tale, Ludwig. This is a true story about a great king. His name was Ludwig – just like yours! Ludwig the Second to be precise, and he was king of the beautiful nation of Bavaria."

She reads in an annoying patronizing singsong tone, but I otherwise find the book to be rather enjoyable. I learn about how King Ludwig II was, like me, eccentric, perhaps even deranged, and about how he commissioned the construction of some of the most majestic palaces in all of history.

I admire the book's photos of the castles he had dreamed up, and even recognize one of them. _Schloss Neuschwanstein_ was the palace that the family and I saw couple of months ago during our vacation in the Bavaria region of Germany!

"So did you enjoy the story Ludwig?"

The book was really more of a biography/reference book, but I express my approval.

"Glad, Ludwig, glad you did."

Mutter sighs. She has a worried and thoughtful look on her face. I remain in her lap and stare expectantly up at her until she lowers her eyes from the far wall and speaks.

"Ludwig, have you ever wondered whatever became of your father?"

_My father_… I suddenly wonder why she hasn't brought it up earlier. Probably because she was waiting for the right moment… but why would now be the right moment?

"Well, after reading some biology books and thus learning how fathers are necessary for the existence of children, I did wonder, but rather than ask I pondered it for a bit and came up with my own conclusions. I decided that either I am _Onkel's_ clone, which you adopted in order to fulfill your wish of having a child to rear, or perhaps I am a splice of yours and _Onkel's_ DNA, or perhaps even your clone but genetically engineered to have a Y chromosome and a few of _Onkel's_ best genes.

"Or perhaps you are turned off by the notion of bioengineered eugenics and you decided merely to submit to insemination at the sperm bank, using the priciest sperm that you handpicked from the best genetic match..."

"Um…"

"I do not ask of you to provide me with the full details if you would be uncomfortable doing so."

"Oh, Ludwig, you have quite the imagination… No, none of those scenarios are so. I was married to your father…"

"Oh so you knew him!" My heart is suddenly thumping with curiosity. "Tell me, is he a brilliant and wealthy scientist and or musician?"

"No…"

"A brilliant and wealthy mathematician?"

"No…"

"A brilliant and wealthy opera vocalist?"

"No…"

"Brilliant and wealthy artist? Novelist? …ballet dancer?"

My mother shakes her head. "No, Ludwig. Your father is a brilliant and wealthy – well, a wealthy king. A very wealthy king."

A king… well I would be deserving of that title… so this was the rationale behind today's story time!

"My father is King Ludwig II of Bavaria! I am King – well, Prince Ludwig the Third!"

My mother laughs as she slowly puts her arms around to caress me. "No, Ludwig, you are not Prince Ludwig the Third of Bavaria. You are Prince Ludwig the – First, I reckon, of Dark Land."

"Dark Land?" I do not recall seeing such a country in the atlas that I had memorized.

"It's not here in the real world."

"_Mutter,_ you are not making any sense. Are you saying I am prince of some imaginary world?"

"No, it's a real world…"

"Then why does it not fall under the category of what we call the real world?"

"_Mein Sohn_, most of the people in this world are not aware of the existence of this other world. The denizens of that other world, on the other hand, are all aware of the existence of this world. That's why this world is colloquially called the real world, even by the other worlders."

I nod in understanding.

"But your father does have a lot of castles built in his name…"

"Beautiful ones like King Ludwig's?"

Mutter hesitates, as if taking care to select the right words to say. "Well, his castles are quite… interesting to behold. Especially the from the inside."

"_Mutter_, I want to meet _Vater_! May I?"

I am anxious, in a somewhat worried way. The entire setup, and her manner of discussing this matter and the tone of her language are all highly suspicious. Was she about to drop a bombshell of disappointment on me? Was my father dead? Brain damaged? Locked up in an insane asylum? Perhaps even… _evil_?

Perhaps he wanted to kill me, or_ Mutter_, or both us?

Perhaps he simply broke her heart?

_Mutter_ let out a sigh. "Yes, you may, Ludwig. As a matter of fact, your father has demanded – I mean, requested that you visit him at his residential castle for a few months.

"Splendid! A family vacation! Do you miss his presence, _Mutter_?"

"As a matter of fact, I… well, would rather not visit him with you…"

"Why not?"

"Well, first of all, he would rather not visit me…" She sighed.

"I apologize Mutter. No need to fill me in on the full details of your marriage."

"You will be leaving to visit him in three days."

"Excellent!" I giggle giddily and hop back on the piano to compose a merry tune to celebrate. I shall title this composition _Paternal Anticipation_.

I simply cannot wait to meet my father the King with the glorious castles!


	6. Vater's Castle

"Please, Ludwig, do something about your hair! Don't you want to look nice for _Vater_?"

I squirm as _Mutter_ attempts to groom me. Being a burgeoning young artist, I cannot allow my focus to diverge between my life's work and a chore as trifling as hygiene, except in the case that my lack thereof becomes threatening to my continued existence or productivity as a musician and scientist.

My grandparents and_ Onkel_ Wolfgang are also here, at the large green pipe in a park full of artistic sculptures. _Onkel_ had already explained to me how the pipe works, according to some laws of physics that worked differently in the other world. Most people here assumed it was just a sculpture; these pipes were secretly constructed around the world and disguised in such ways so that only those who knew of the other world would use them. I would have to read on the history behind this marvelous technology at my father's castle library.

_Mutter _is crying and wiping her face with a handkerchief. "My baby boy's going on his first trip all by himself!"

"May_ Onkel_ come with me?" I ask.

"I am afraid that I am not welcome," Wolfgang said. "Your mother has said too much about me over the phone. But…" There was a definite water level in Wolfgang's goggles, and it was beginning to rise. He suddenly screamed and grabbed me and lifted his goggles to dry his eyes on my hair.

"I'm going to miss you Ludwig! I'm going to miss blowing up grandma's brains and teaching you how to build lasers and splice DNA and solve differential equations and synthesize illegal drugs for the fun of it!"

"_Onkel_, it's only for one month…"

I did not understand my family's over-expression of emotions. They do it all the time, but this moment was particularly emotional. If they would only save it for the music they write as I do…

"All right, _mein Sohn_, your father said he's sent one of his servants to meet you on the other side of the pipe… Kamek, I believe he's called.

"Oh, and also remember that the world on the other side of the pipe is heavily influenced by American culture," Mutter added with a tone of disdain that she expressed whenever she discussed anything pertaining to the most populated country in the continent of North America.

I toss my violin case into the pipe. I would have brought the piano if it wasn't so heavy. I also throw in a backpack full of European treats, for Mutter said that the candy elsewhere isn't nearly as good.

I fearlessly jump into the pipe.

What a surreal experience! The circle of light above me shrinks to a point and then disappears. As I fall I feel like I'm being squashed, then like I'm being stretched, "spaghettified", as black hole theorists would call it, and then like I'm falling upward…

I am finally thrust out of the other end of the pipe and onto the soft green grass of Dark Land. Or wherever in the not-so- "real" world this is…

And Dark Land is certainly not a fitting title.

There are strange, cylindrical hills in the distance, cylindrical except for their spherical tops, and cubes with question marks floating in the air.

And the clouds… they have…

Eyes. Everything has eyes. The hills, the flowers, some of the floating blocks, even the mushrooms…

And there are lots of mushrooms…

This world does not make any sense! My brain screams. Has _Onkel_ Wolfgang drugged me with lysergic acid diethylamide?

I scream and attempt to scramble back up the pipe to return to Vienna, which is surprisingly easy; apparently there is less gravity in this world? But then I am grabbed from behind.

The perpetrator is a Koopa like me, but of a physically softer race, and he is wearing glasses and a blue costume.

"Are you Master Ludwig von Koopa?" he asks.

"I will not answer until you introduce yourself," I respond.

"I am Kamek, and the King sent me all the way here from Dark Land to fetch you. That is, if you indeed are the Prince Ludwig von Koopa."

"Yes, it is I, Prince Ludwig von Koopa," I answer. I like the way "Prince" sounds.

"Hmm, your vocabulary is quite good for your age," Kamek remarks. "The King couldn't even say simple sentences when he was your age."

I am immediately embarrassed. What kind of one year old does NOT know how to speak in sentences?

"Please tell me Dark Land isn't like…" I grimace at my surroundings. "…this."

Kamek laughs in a cackling tone that strikes me as rather sarcastic. "Nothing like this, trust me. Now hop on."

Kamek places a broom between his legs and motions toward the bristles.

I simply gape at this show of inappropriate behavior.

Kamek cackles. "This isn't the real world, Your Highness. Broomsticks can fly."

I am suddenly swooped into the air on his broomstick. I scream and blink my eyes, trying to wake myself from this twisted nightmare. Why couldn't _Vater_ have sent a royal coach drawn by Lipizzaner stallions to pick me up? Or a first class airplane if it's too far, as evident by how long Kamek seems to be taking to get there…

At long last Kamek lands his broom in what I assume is my father's territory. I find myself unexpectedly shivery. I'm going to meet my father, discover my roots, see his castles!

I open my eyes wide and look around. The sky is dark, either from storm clouds or smoke, and there are dull noises in the distance that might be thunder or volcanic activity, though something tells me that it is the sound of cannon blasts.

A nation at war. Well, great kings have to build their empires somehow…

I seize a handful of the soil. Black, volcanic, ashy. Yet barren, few traces of plant life. In the distance I can see thick jungles and hot glowing lava rivers flowing out of caverns.

I turn around and I see it. The castle. Immense and stony, like a battle fortress rather than a residential palace.

Definitely not inspired by _Der M__ӓ__rchenk__ӧ__nig_.

The door raises and Kamek drags my hesitant self in. The palace's interior lacks the coziness of even the most primitive medieval forts, which at least had festive decorations to adorn the gray walls.

And yet this "palace" is warm. Surprising that such a castle, which by antiquity of design alone would be condemned under Renaissance standards, would contain central heating.

But then, being built out of the bowels of a volcano would explain it. As would the pool of lava in the center of the front room.

"Where is my father?" I ask Kamek.

I hear a loud booming voice that shakes the castle. It is shortly accompanied by a thunderous quake.

ERUPTION ALERT! I turn around and head for the front door. What kind of fool would live in such a geologically active area?

I bang my head almost immediately.

I look up and find myself confronted with a mighty adult male Koopa, who to me seemed at least ten times taller than me and well over a hundred times as heavy. He has ginger hair on his head, and devilish looking horns, and spiked cuffs on his hands. He smells quite different from my family in Austria, in a rather unpleasant way that I could not describe…

"BOWSER JUNIOR!" The Koopa man seizes me and hugs me tightly, far tighter than my mother or even Onkel ever has. I am bewildered by what he had called me. _Bowser Junior_?

"_Vater, mein Name ist Ludwig."_

"LUDWIG?" My father pronounces it in a vulgar accent and then lets out a frustrated roar.

"Your father is upset that your mother named you," Kamek explains. "He wanted to name you Bowser Junior. Also, he is quite upset that the name happens to be the same name as one of the pair of plumbers that constantly antagonize him."

Kamek rushes over to my father to calm him down. He begins to speak in the same vulgar accent that my father speaks in. So thick and vulgar it is that I cannot understand it at all; I listen intently in an instinctive attempt to discern what they are saying…

I then realize that they aren't speaking in my tongue. They are speaking ENGLISH. My mother had given me a few lessons in other languages, including English, but I had been so busy with my studies in science and music that I had shelved my ambitions of becoming a hyperpolyglot for the moment, despite my mother's persistent warnings that language acquisition ability fades with age. Nonsense, at least for such an exceptional individual such as I.

Studying languages is such a bore anyways… unless you are thrown into a situation in which you are inundated with the target language and thus forced to sink or swim without any hold for your native tongue to keep you afloat.

Father turns around and stomps toward me. In physical appearance, he is quite intimidating, and I act on my instinctive urge to withdraw into my shell.

"Ludwig Koopa – Ludwig VON Koopa?" he says in the vulgar English manner, which pronounces the "u" sound like "uh" rather than "oo", the "w" in a way that is difficult for some German dialects to pronounce, and the "g" like it was pronounced at the beginning of a word rather than making the "k" sound that it's supposed to make at the end of a word.

"Ludwig-" I begin to correct him but he cuts me off with a tyrannical roar.

"SHUT UP AND LISTEN TO ME I AM KING!" He speaks slowly to assure that I understand, despite my limited English. "I AM KING BOWSER KOOPA OF DARK LAND, AND ALSO YOUR DAD, BUT YOU ARE TO ADDRESS ME AS KING DAD, GOT IT?"

"_Ja_ – Yes, King Dad."

"AND YOU ARE CROWN PRINCE OF DARK LAND BUT AS LONG AS I AM ALIVE I AM IN CHARGE DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"

"Yes Dad."

"AHEM!"  
>"—King Dad."<p>

"AND YOU ARE TO LEARN AND SPEAK ENGLISH AND ONLY ENGLISH WHILE YOU ARE HERE, IS THAT UNDERSTOOD?"

"Yes King Dad."

"AND YOU ARE TO DO EVERYTHING I TELL YOU TO AND IF YOU DON'T YOU WILL BE THROWN IN THE DUNGEON AS PUNISHMENT DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"

What dungeon? This entire castle is a dungeon!

"Yes King Dad."

"DO YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS?"

None that I do not fear to ask.

"Good. Now… run around, go do whatever. Just STAY OUT OF THE HAREM'S QUARTERS GOT IT?"

"Harem?" I asked.

"Where the women are kept."

I nod and make a note to stay away from any women I see. Though I want to know why but I am afraid to ask. Oh, how terrible to be afraid to ask WHY!

Kamek accompanies me as I explore the castle. I marvel at the enormous paintings of Bowser and his ancestors, wondering if he will have one painted of me someday. I run into some terrifying statues built to resemble Bowser. Kamek tells me that they breathe fire when the castle is under lockdown.

"Kamek, is there a room that is not filled with lava?" The lava makes me feel rather queasy.

"Well… how about I introduce you to the library?"

A library HERE? I am all too eager to visit.

But the library proves to be a disappointment as well. Cold, musty, no furniture or carpets, and cobwebs between the bookshelves.

At least I am away from the lava – and from Bowser. I take out my violin and begin to play it.

If the soul could speak, I believe that it would sound of violin notes…

The mind spins a melody of mixed torments – fear, shock, sullenness, and, ever so mildly, despair. The melody makes me cry to listen to, and the tears fuel further composition.

"LUDWIG! STOP PLAYING THAT SCREECHY THING THIS INSTANT OR I WILL PERSONALLY HUNT YOU DOWN AND THROW YOU IN THE BASEMENT!"

So much for that. I take out a book written in English and attempt to decipher it until I hear my father's roar again.

"DINNER!"

Kamek escorts me to the dinner table – a long, roughly carved wooden table, with Bowser seated at one end with a paper bag. He beckoned me to sit at his right side.

Bowser sighs as he looked at me. "You look like a kook. I'm calling you Kooky." He rubs his hand roughly through my hair, yanking at some of the tangled ends. "Since it's your first night here, I decided to make it a treat for you and order in."

He removes a carton of fried potato strips and a round sandwich that he removes the wax paper from, and he takes a pair of plastic utensils and begins to cut the sandwich up. I scream in protest and grab the sandwich.

I stare at the sandwich, unable to recognize what form of cuisine it is. It smells strangely different and bland compared to the foods I normally eat, yet strangely and sickeningly appetizing…

"What's the matter? Haven't you ever seen a hamburger before?"

_Hamburger?_ I had been to Hamburg and I had not seen or eaten anything similar to this!

I remove the bun and stare at the meat – or at least I think it is meat – minced and compressed meat of some sort. Probably commoner fare, which would explain why I had never been exposed to it before. But I was mystified and slightly nauseated by the inedible-looking yellow putty that had been splattered over the meat in the shape of a square.

"_Was ist das_?" I ask, a phrase similar enough to the English translation that I could get away with saying it, although I would have to work on the accent…

"Why, that's cheese – damnit has your snotty mother ever taken you out for fast food before?"

As a matter of fact she hadn't – she avoids fast food venues like the plague. And this so-called cheese resembles anything but – REAL cheese coagulates at this temperature, rather than softening into a smooth even semisolid fondue. Is this what Americans call cheese?

I take a bite of the impoverished Hamburger's sandwich. Too bland to be disgusting, and yet somehow strangely addicting. Must be the overabundance of sodium chloride with traces of iodide, glucose and triglycerides with improperly saturated acid groups attached.

"Eat your French fries," says Bowser after I take a second bite.

The treat that he had referred to as French is actually Belgian. Leave it to an American-influenced culture to confuse the nationalities, to echo _Mutter's_ general attitude toward the country's geographical awareness. I had been to Belgium once and found myself quite addicted to their fried potatoes, to the point that _Mutter_ swore never to take me back.

The American-style "French" fries are also bland, and softer than Belgium's, and not as earthy-tasting, causing me to question what sort of filler was used to stretch the processed potatoes that were used. As unsatisfying as the hamburger, and also as addicting, if not more so.

"V-King Dad, I want hollandaise sauce," I say in my not-yet eloquent English.

"What? You mean for your French fries? Why don't you use ketchup?" He tossed a few packets of the American condiment at me.

"I want hollandaise!"

"Hollandaise? That's like mayonnaise, right?"

Sort of, but not quite. I do not yet have the vocabulary or fluency of grammar to express this thought to him.

"That's weird, but then you Europeans are a weird bunch. I can have the cooks bring you some mayonnaise if you want."

"Yes," I say.

When the servants arrive with the mayonnaise, I turn my nose up as soon as I see that it is in a sealed jar. I only eat the sauce FRESH! How do the eggs remained preserved in a jar for so long anyway? Certainly not without distasteful preserving toxins…

"Damn it you ARE picky! Just eat the ketchup."

I bite open the ketchup packet and slurp it out. Salty, savory and sweet at the same time, in a way that excites all of the taste buds without triggering the gag reflex. Lacking in subtlety, of course, but addictive, especially in combination with the fries.

At least Bowser was not scolding me for poor table manners.

"You like fast food, don't you? See, it doesn't have to be expensive to taste good, like your mother thinks!"

When I am finished, I ask Kamek to translate what I want to say to Bowser.

"Sire, the Prince says that expensive food is healthier, and that being a King you should have no trouble affording it."

"What? Listen here, son, I might be King but I'm not made of money!"

Kamek translates for me. My father – a pauper king?

"Things are gonna be tight around here until tax time next month! Why do you think I have all those army tanks out conquering other kingdoms for me? There just isn't enough money to steal in Dark Land!"

_Steal? _

"Your Highness, the Prince asks what you squander so much money on that deems it necessary to steal from the citizens".

"Well, ahem, just finish your fries. Goddam, arguing with a one year old…"

"Prince Ludwig has finished his fries, Sire, and he wants the rest of yours."

"You know what? I believe it's your bedtime, mister!"

"He says that his bedtime is not for another three hours."

"Well, we have to account for time zone differences, don't we?"

Bowser grabs me and takes me to a room that looks like a miniature dungeon, decorated with a baby crib (I had been sleeping in an adult-size bed for nearly five months now) and a television (which I seldom watched). He puts me in the crib and slams the door shut, locking it.

How DARE he treat me this way! What kind of king is he? What kind of FATHER is he?

No culture, no interest in science or music – how could we be related?

I was expecting a great leader with a great kingdom and I get… this. An uncouth brute whose kingdom is ravaged by war and unfair taxes.

A tyrant. EVIL. Like _Herr_ Hitler.

I am crying. Like the baby that I am. This room is cold, and ungratifying to the aesthete, and although the notes are composing themselves in my head I am without violin.

I gasp in shock and shame when Kamek teleports into my room.

"I believe this is yours," he says, handing me my violin and bow.

"_Danke_". I immediately begin to play, with a vibrato that mimicks the way my body quakes as I repress my sobs.

"Would you like to watch some television, my Prince?" Kamek asks.

I hold my head somewhat higher at the title. Even though all it meant was that I was set to inherit a desolate wasteland and an enormous debt to the citizens.

"_Nein, danke_." I was too intent on making the notes sound just right.

"It might help you to learn English."

"How did you learn _Deutsch_ anyway?" I ask.

"Oh, well, when I heard you were coming from Austria, knowing you would need help understanding things, I did a spell on myself to make me instantly learn the language."

"Why don't you just make me learn English with a spell?"

"Spells such as that are dangerous, my Prince. It nearly killed me to use it on myself, I'm afraid to try it on you."

He turned on the television. "Your father gets every channel in the galaxy, are there any you have in mind?"

Every channel in the GALAXY? The men of the real world had barely made it to the moon. Must be very expensive to have that kind of reception – so THAT'S where all the taxpayers' money was going!

"Well, are there any music channels?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. I assume you mean classical music, there is one that I know that features documentaries on the life history of composers old and new, and also broadcasts symphony orchestras."

He turns the TV to the Ovation channel and teleports out of the room.

Television. Like books, but for people whose minds are too weak to their own visualizing. That was what I had always thought.

Still, even the crudest of televised garbage can still be educational if you are trying to learn a language…


	7. English

"_MUTTER_!"

I cry unabashedly to her over the phone.

"Don't let him keep me here! I miss _Wien_! I want to go back to _Österreich_!"

"I am sorry,_ Liebling_, but it is out of my hands. It's only for a month, please try to bear with him..."

"Would you send me a care package? PLEASE? I ate all of my good chocolates last night! I want _Mozartkugeln_ and Milka and Kinder Eggs and Ritter and Lindt truffles and anything else you think they might not have over here..."

"I'll see what I can get you. Are you eating right?"

"Um, well, I am not sure if what he has fed me is right for eating... he doesn't have much of a library, he has no instruments, and he HATES it when I play the violin! HOW can we POSSIBLY be related? Are you absolutely sure that he's related to me?"

"Ludwig, I have only been with one man in my entire life, so yes, I am sure. And I know what it's like there, why do you think I left with your egg in hand as soon as I possibly could?"

"WHY of all people would you pick HIM to father your child?"

"Don't ask me, ask your _Onkel._ He was the one who set us up."

"I want to speak with Onkel!"

"I am sorry, but he is, um, not available for the next seventy-two hours."

"And he treats me like a baby!"

"Well, sweetheart, I know that this is hard for you to accept, but at the age of one year, you ARE a baby. He just doesn't recognize how advanced for your age you are yet. Give him some time. Maybe he doesn't appreciate your music skills, but he might appreciate your scientific talent."

"Only so he can use me to make bombs or weapons or genetically engineered monsters or something like that! He's EVIL!"

"Oh, _liebe_, he's not quite as evil as he likes to make believe that he is. I will admit, he did the, um, absolute BEST that he could to make my wedding, um, special... and, I must say, it was quite a, um, memorable occasion... anyway, just look on the bright side. He is a king, which makes you a prince. And not only that, but you are his first-born prince, which makes you the heir to the throne."

"Monarchies were abolished in Austria for a reason, _Mutter!"_

"As were nobility-denoting prefixes, but over there, you are free to insist that others call you Ludwig VON Koopa in public! Maybe it's not much of a kingdom, but one day, it will be yours, and you will have the power to make it a fine country like your beloved _Österreich_. Now, are you practicing your English?"

"A little... Why can't he learn MY language?"

"I am sorry, but some cultures are like that, mainly English-speaking cultures, namely Dark Landers and Americans. You had better study your English well, and become perfectly fluent. You don't want to end up like your _Onkel_, do you? Over sixty years old, and monolingual-"

"And on a seventy-two hour hold."

"I certainly hope you do not backtalk to your father like that! He will punish you quite harshly, I'm afraid. He will breathe fire on you, and he has a dungeon and is not afraid to use it."

"No worries there, I do not yet know enough English to backsass him properly. As a matter of fact, he doesn't let me speak German, so I should learn soon enough."

"Good. Now, I am sorry that your father is not the Märchenkönig that you thought he was..."

"I'M HOME SON!"

"I know what that means. Talk to you later, Mutter. _Auf wiedersehen_!"

I hang up the phone and nervously face my father, half-dreading to see what sort of presents he bought me.

"Look, Kooky, at all of the nice toys I got for you to play with!"

Toys? I don't play with toys! Well, I collect Kinder Egg toys, the higher-quality ones that I have to go to Germany to get, but that is completely different!

Bowser takes the department store bags to my bedroom and dumps the contents out. I try not to frown, seeing that I have not played with such toys since I was... one day old, I guess...

"See, I got you this nice rattle," he says, shaking it as if I am too idiotic to figure out how the child-friendly maraca operates.

"And here are some blocks with the alphabet letters on them so you can learn your ABC's, and I mean the English ABC's, not whatever freaky alphabet you use in Germany..."

The English name for _Deutschland._ Sigh. Austria, you moron!

"And here is a teddy bear for you to sleep with, he's got extra fuzzy fur, and he says "I love you" when you hug it! And since you take after your mother and you like music, here's a xylophone, I think they call it a glockenspiel on your planet, I don't know if you're old enough for it yet, though..."

I take the mallet and bang a tune of my own composition on the cheap rainbow-colored metal bars. The mallet was attached to the instrument by a string, and unfortunately, there was only one mallet.

"And here's a crib mobile that plays lullabies while twinkling lights and spinning these pretty colorful things! And some video tapes with some fun cartoonies for you to watch! And I got these nice posters of my favorite sports and race car and motorbike teams so you can have something on your wall to look at, I thought you might like something that's not quite so babyish to look at for a change."

I am not sure that I prefer his sort of interests any more than toddler decor. What I would have liked would be some fine paintings, particularly of famous composers, or at the very least reproductions of such, and maybe a periodic table! Grr, if ONLY I could speak English well enough to tell him what I REALLY want!

So I make it my mission, over the next couple of weeks, to become fully proficient in English. I am aided somewhat by the cartoon tapes that he bought, and by searching through his many, MANY channels for German movies with English subtitles (English movies with German subtitles are far harder to find). I record _Der Untergang_ and rewatch it a couple of times until I am certain that I fully understand which English words correspond to which German words.

I then move on to watching English movies with English subtitles so I can understand how the words are pronounced. I am much amused by _The Sound of Music; _it portrays Austria in a very incorrect and stereotypical way, but the music is decent and I become homesick looking at the backdrop, which was apparently the actual city of Salzburg.

I find that, as in German, English words are pronounced in different ways depending on the region that the speaker comes from, although there is not quite the dialectical variation that exists in the German language. My _Onkel_ speaks a very thick Viennese dialect, my grandmother rather less thickly, my grandfather a Bavarian dialect of some sort. My _Mutter_ speaks Standard German, as do I, though I am rather good at affecting the _Schönbrunnerdeutsch_ spoken by the Habsburg Imperial Court.

By the time my month in purgatory is half over, I am already more fluent in English than my own father is. I have learned much from his own vulgar speech as well; one time, after he pounds me on the bottom for mimicking his profane language, it suddenly dawns upon me why English speakers are so amused by the tiny Austrian town of Fucking.

"Father..."

"THAT IS KING FATHER TO YOU!" he roars.

"King Father, then. I desire a piano to play. Please."

Most Austrians would be irritated if I constantly spoke with this _Schönbrunnerdeutsch_ accent, but English speakers seem to find it amusing, even attractive.

"WHY DO YOU WANT A FUCKING PIANO? YOU'VE GOT A FUCKING VIOLIN! GO TO YOUR ROOM AND PLAY WITH YOUR GLOCKENSPIEL!"

"Actually, my violin is Italian," I say, smirking at my own little joke. "And I suppose that if it runs so against your wishes for me to have a piano in your castle, then I can simply wait until I get back to my mother's. However, I do miss doing experiments with my great-uncle - would you happen to have any lab equipment in this castle, by any chance?"

"For heaven's sake, that's the LAST thing this castle needs is a resident mad scientist! I had one once and he caused me so much grief that I had to throw him into the lava!"

"I see. Would you care to explain to me how you manage to keep your lava so hot?"

"It's too complicated for you to understand, Kooky," he says, patting me on the head. "Wait until you're at least in college."

"But you never even finished high school!"

"I got a GED! And I took a few classes in mechanics at the local community college!"

Community college... I have heard much on this term on the television I have watched... denotes a school like a university, except it only has lower-division classes, and very poorly taught ones at that, cheaper (apparently in this country the residents must PAY to attend university) and easier to get into than a real university, but at the cost of intelligent peers and extracurriculars that look good on a grad school application, not to mention being trapped in a two-year binding agreement before one is allowed to transfer to a real university - NO THANK YOU.

"Well, King Father, dear, I have nothing more to say to you. I shall now spend the day exploring the castle."

"Good, you haven't been out of your bedroom or that library in a while. Just DON'T GO NEAR THE LAVA OR ANY OF THE OTHER SECURITY DEVICES AND STEER CLEAR OF THE HAREM'S QUARTERS AS WELL."

Whatever. I should only be so lucky as to find out exactly what he is talking about.


	8. The Door

"King Dad, would you mind showing me around the castle?" I call from a balcony overlooking a pool of lava.

"NOT NOW GODDAMNIT! GOD DAMN I CAN'T EVEN WATCH A GODDAMN FOOTBALL GAME! GO ASK KAMEK TO GIVE YOU THE GRAND TOUR!"

Football. Ugh. Dull sport - actually, in my opinion, all sports are dull. They offer little intellectual value to the viewer other than visual displays of basic physical principles and a modicum of strategy, which cannot be easily applied to such a chaotic and variable game.

"OH AND ANOTHER THING - STAY OUT OF THE ROOM WITH THE LAVA!"

Which room with the lava? Nearly every door I open exposes me to a room filled with lava!

Well, the red curtains are SORT OF attractive - although pale, cool, muted colors are more the theme at my other home.

Get used to it, I tell myself. It's your home for another two weeks.

And for any other time that the King decides that he wants me to stay for a month or so. He is, after all, my father, not my uncle or grandfather or other sort of extended family member, and thus has as much right to my custody as my mother does.

The statues of him are quite distasteful. As are the gray stone walls, which is a shame, for the chessboard-tiled floor that covers certain parts of the otherwise similarly-stony floor would otherwise look quite elegant.

Overall, his decor evokes a sense of power, of intimidation, not refined, cultured elegance. Even so, it could still be decorated to serve both purposes...

Why am I concerned over home decor? I should be trying to salvage some junk and chemicals that I could use to make experimental contraptions and formulas!

I make it my business to open every door that I see.

That isn't locked.

As is the large, ornately carved (what a pleasant surprise!) wooden door that I encounter in the very back of the middle story of the castle.

I jump at the appearance of a skeletal-looking Koopa Troopa, one of Father's many minions on patrol. My, does Bowser ever feed his servants, or even pay them enough to buy enough food to live on?

"Pardon me, sir, would you mind unlocking this door for me?"

The ashen, emaciated Koopa lifts a bone the same color as his body, only too wide to fit into the lock to use as a lockpick. He aims and tosses it at ME.

I duck as the bone spirals through the air, and further defies the laws of physics by swerving backward like a boomerang.

I clutch the bone out of the air on its trip back to its owner. Whatever sort of experiment is this?

I toss it at the Koopa, failing to achieve the mechanically impossible trajectory that it had been sent to me with, and it knocks the Koopa on the chin, causing it to fall backwards and hide in its shell.

I leap onto the shell and stomp it - into dust.

DUST.

This creature... was not, as I had thought a second ago, merely skin and bones. It was, in fact, merely the BONES. Nothing more than an animated collection of dry, ancient, brittle, powdery BONES!

How horrifying... what kind of sick experimentalist did this?

Nevertheless, I dig through the crumbled remans for a bone strong and thin enough to be used as a lockpick - preferably a piece of the clavicle, which is actually roughly shaped like the sort of key that would fit this. I do not know what is behind the elegant gilded-handled door, all I know is that I want to see what's behind it. Any door that looks like that, especially inside an otherwise dreary and artless battle fortress, MUST have something good behind it. Perhaps the King's most treasured secrets?

His money? Valuables? Crown jewels?

I grab onto the door handle to hoist myself up to the lock and jam the bone into the lock.

The old-fashioned lock that obstructs me from entering through this door should not be too difficult to open with half of a clavicle. It is one of the stronger bones of the body, but I still fear that it will crumble as I hear it grind inside the lock. Just grate the edges a little bit and it will be perfectly key-shaped, hence the name, which is derived from the Latin word for "key"...

I hear the clatter of bones behind me. I turn my head around in horror to find that the rotted skeleton I had crushed had reassembled itself and come BACK TO LIFE!

My fingers quiver at the touch of a bone that I now know is possessed. Still, I grind it furiously through the lock, simultaneously twisting the door handle, while the Skeleton-Koopa, after clutching the part of his chest that now had only half a clavicle, prepares to toss his humerus at me again. I stretch my head, long messy hair and all, out of the way, and it thumps off of the door and bounced back to hit the skeleton on the skull.

At last, the door swings open. I hear a cheerful female voice ask, "Who's there?"

I drop the haunted clavicle and let go of the door handle, running into the room without looking back lest the skeleton troopa revive again.


	9. Crime and Punishment

The woman who had answered the door expresses her disgust at the repulsive undead creature and kicks it away before closing the door.

She is too a dragon-Koopa, but smaller and thinner than my own mother. Her shell is golden-yellow in color, her hair long and streaked in a rainbow of colors.

"Hi, I am Queen Consort Lilly Koopa, one of King Bowser's wives, pleasure to meet you, little fella."

So THIS is the forbidden harem's quarters that Father had warned me to stay away from!

I tentatively shake Lilly's hand as I eyeball the room. Not as refined as Mother's house, but very luxurious, albeit in a tacky way. Fuzzy pink cushions and female undergarments little the cushioned furniture. A giant vanity with pink heart-shaped lightbulbs lined up on the edges of a heart-shaped mirror displays a countertop completely covered by used and unused makeup containers, and flashy reminders of the current pop culture are taped up on the mirror as well as all over the walls.

"Please, have a seat." Lilly picks me up and places me in a hot pink beanbag chair while she pushes the pink satin curtains of her canopy bed back to plop down over it.

She seems physically attractive, and young, probably in her early to mid twenties, but something about the way her eyes roll around in her head, her crooked facial expressions (more than just the crookedness of her teeth), the way she walks and the lazy, almost incoherent rhythm with which she talks suggest that she is... well, not afflicted by the genetic sort of insanity that possesses my great uncle Wolfgang, at least not solely... rather, that she is chemically stupefied.

"I'm sorry that that icky old Dry Bones was bothering you," she mumbled. "So do you want to see my babies?"

Children? I have... siblings?

Well, half-siblings - I shudder at the thought, me having half-siblings... a _faux pas_ for high society... how... embarrassing...

Lilly pulls two eggs out from her bed's overabundance of plushy pillows. Each of the eggs had a name written on it with a permanent marker - does she not know that can be toxic to the embryo?

"This one is Iggy Hop... like Iggy Pop, you know?"

No, actually, I do not know.

"And this one is Lemmy Hip... like Lemmy Kilmister, you know?"

No, I do not know that one either.

"And his middle name is Hip just so he can be like his brother, you know, Hip and Hop?"

I really do not get it.

"I guess you never heard of The Stooges or Motörhead, have you?"

Heard of what?

She turns on her audiocassette player. It booms with a loud, abrasive noise... there is sort of a melody to it, but the arrangement is simply FRIGHTENING... is this supposed to be music?

Lilly seems to enjoy it, but I am terrified. I run through the curtain of beads into the next room.

In this room sits another thin female Koopa, a blonde pink-shelled one wearing a pink bow speckled white, as well as a brassiere of some sort and a skirt, both pink. The entire room is flooded with pink. She too has a pink heart lightbulb vanity.

"And who dares to invade the privacy of QUEEN Emilie Koopa, pop star, movie star and supermodel extraordinaire?"

"Oh PLEASE!" shouts an older, rougher female voice from the next room. "Prostitute extraordinaire is more like it."

"SHUSH! PORN STAR, for your information! And SOON TO BE pop star and movie star and supermodel extraordinaire thanks to the wealth and connections of my ROYAL husband!"

"Well, in order to be that, you have to at least know how to sing!"

"I DO know how to sing! Would you care to listen, kid?"

By "kid", Emilie clearly means me. "Um, sure..."

Emilie cleared her throat and began to sing some song I don't recognize... However, I could tell that her voice is not up to opera standards.

"Ma'am, your voice is not exactly, um, operatic... and the harmony is not quite there..."

"HAH!" roared the older female voice. "Even the kid knows you can't sing!"

"I CAN TOO!" Emilie whines, tearing up. "So I need to work on it a little..."

"Heh, you've been working on it a lot, judging by that you should be the queen of teenybopper pop already!"

Emilie puts a tissue to her face and clutches her own egg. "Please don't talk that way around my little Wendy, you'll hurt her self esteem..."

"Shouldn't you at least know whether your child is a boy or a girl before you name it?"

"She's a girl, i just know it!" Emilie polishes the surface of the egg with her wet tissue, for the purpose of making the shell more reflective for the sake of her own vanity, I guess. She stares at her reflection on the egg for a moment before hugging it, dripping tears all over it.

"Well I know that my babies are boys!" says Lilly.

"I should hope so, they're nearly five months overdue, so they are certainly old enough to tell," says the older Koopa. "They should have been born at the same time as my Roy - Roy, get back here!"

A bald pink-shelled Koopa child, slightly larger than myself, wearing sunglasses too large for his stunted cranium, toddles out of her room.

I had never been around other children of my own species before - or children of any species, for that matter - although Mutter did intend on socializing me with others my own age when I got to be somewhat older.

I become fully aware and somewhat awed by the fact that this beefy, physically precocious toddler of five months (and already larger than I am now, let alone when I was his age!) is my brother - well, half-brother. I stare at him, trying to find a similarity between the two of us, knowing that there would be few, for I take more after my mother, whom he does not share. I approach closer to examine-

_BAM! _ Roy punches me in the forehead, knocking me backwards.

Roy stands there and laughs as I rub my forehead, hoping he did not damage my developing frontal lobes. Very strong for his age, although physical strength is rather an obsolete trait in modern society. Also, I do not see the humor in physically attacking someone, or in somebody being in pain from it.

"ROY! BACK TO BED!"

His mother, a dragon-Koopa nearly as large as Bowser himself, with a violet-colored shell and black hair that was obviously a wig, grabbed him and spanked his little tail, causing him to cry, before tossing him in her room. She turned back to glower at me, as though I had harmed her child or otherwise done something wrong. I mean, I know I am not supposed to be in the harem's quarters, but my behavior had otherwise been impeccable.

"Meet Queen Consort Clawdia Koopa," Lilly almost mumbles through faint giggles.

"And who exactly are you?" Clawdia asks me.

"Why, I am Prince Ludwig von Koopa, Crown Prince of Dark Land."

"Why, that's IMPOSSIBLE! MY SON is the Crown Prince of Dark Land..."

She stares at me for a second, her eyes rolled back from concentrating on withdrawing a memory into the conscious. "The accent... you are the spawn of that stuck-up Eurotrash scum that left Bowser!"

"Yeah, I think I remember her," says Lilly. "She... she was Vietnamese, right?"

"Viennese," I correct, but the adult women ignore me.

"No, I think she was Australian," Clawdia says, ignoring me when I correct her with "Austrian".

"I don't remember her," says Emilie.

"She left before Bowser married you. Anyway, MY SON is the one who is next in line to be King, not you!"

"Shut up, he never told you specifically that your son was Crown Prince, you just assumed that he was Bowser's first born," said Emilie.

"No way, he is clearly younger than Roy..."

"No way! I mean listen to him, he has got to be at least seven years old to have that kind of vocabulary!" said Lilly. "Um, exactly how old are you again, Ludwig?"

"I am thirteen months old."

"NO WAY!" shouts Clawdia.

"You cannot be that young," says Emilie.

"Well, either way, he's older than your kid," says Lilly. "Just like Roy is really big and strong for his age, Ludwig here is just really smart for his age."

For somebody who is clearly stoned, Lilly makes an awful lot of sense.

"Besides, if I remember correctly, my Lemmy here was laid a couple of hours before your Roy", she says, absentmindedly rubbing her hands over the eggs. "Or was it Iggy..."

"Doesn't matter, what matters is who hatched first, and your eggs are duds anyway."

"IGGY AND LEMMY ARE NOT DUDS! They are... just late hatchers, that's all."

"Well, you should just go back to Australia or Germany or wherever you came from!" Clawdia shouts at me.

"I will, when my month-long forced visit is over, return to my home in Vienna, AUSTRIA. And GLADLY, might I mention."

So these are the sort of women that my father likes - a junkie, a sexualized diva, and a bullysome matriarch. No wonder Mutter left him. I must wonder why Mutter would marry Bowser anyway... and why he, considering his disdain for anything of fine taste, would marry her...

Lilly lies on her belly on her bed, kissing her eggs sloppily and making lipstick doodles on them, while waving her feet in the air back and forth.

"See how dopey I am?" she asks me, her voice slurred from talking with her upper jaw hanging from the egg.

"Um, yes. Yes indeed."

"Well don't worry about it. It's just the acid, that's all."

Acid? "What kind of acid?"

"The really cheap kind. You'd think that King Bowser would give me a bit more spending money, seeing that he's the King and all..."

"What's the pH of the acid?"

"Drug dealer doesn't have a Ph. D. That's why his acid sells for so cheap..."

"Maybe if I can have a sample of it, I can test it and tell you what kind of acid it is..."

"No, no, you don't need to be getting into this crap. It will fuck your smart little brain up..."

Lilly opens a miniature urn and takes out a few crystalline pebbles to lay on a small white square of paper. She rolls it up into a narrow cylinder, places one end in her mouth, and sets the other end ablaze with her pocket-sized Bunsen burner.

I smell the fumes that waft off of the burning end...

"Why are you burning and inhaling that? Because if that is what I think it is, then you are poisoning yourself!"

"It's crack and crystal," she says, giggling, her arm shaking with the rolled-up sample of whatever "crack" and "crystal" are colloquial names for.

"LILLY ARE YOU SMOKING COKE AND METH AGAIN?" Clawdia shouts.

"Aaaauuuhhhh..." Lilly sits in place, drooling, her body shaking. "I'm feeling it now, oh yeah..."

"Omigosh, she is totally high!" shouts Emilie. "Where's the walkie-talkie..."

Clawdia already has the remote communication device in hand. "Bowser, Lilly needs to go to rehab again..."

"It's ok, it's ok, I'm not shooting up anymore, it's just a bit of rocks..." Lilly plays with her eggs, propping them up on the bed, turning them around, making them switch places, almost obsessively... she suddenly lets out a shockingly loud, high-pitched laugh.

I jump when Bowser bursts through the ornate door that I had originally entered through. I hide under Lilly's pillows, hoping that he hasn't noticed me yet.

My father grabs Lilly and restrains her against the wall.

"Ohh, Bowser, how... kinky..." Lilly laughs.

"We aren't playing! HAVEN'T I TOLD YOU TO KEEP CLEAN OFF THE SHIT?"

"...yeeeeeehhh..."

"Hold still. The police are coming to take you back to rehab."

"Ok... Ludwig could you take care of my eggs while I'm gone?"

"LUDWIG IS IN HERE?"

"Yes, he's hiding under my pillows..."

"CLAWDIA HOLD ONTO LILLY UNTIL THE POLICE COME I'VE GOT OTHER BUSINESS TO TAKE CARE OF!"

Clawdia took over Bowser's job while he rushed over to Lilly's bed to rip the pillows apart and grab me by the tail.

"WHAT HAVE I TOLD YOU ABOUT DISTURBING THE WIVES?"

"Very little, actually."

"WELL FOR DISOBEYING ME YOU HAVE EARNED A TRIP TO THE DUNGEON!"

The dungeon that he tosses me into is a spacious yet filthy and ugly room, even uglier than the rest of the castle, though surprisingly warm and well-lit, no doubt due to the trenches of lava guarding many of the walls. Ancient bones are strewn around the floor, which is coated with bone dust. There is no excuse for such filth and clutter, not when it could so easily be tossed and swept into the lava.

Which, I presume, is exactly what had happened to the worst of it.

I cringe at an entire skeleton I see locked at the carpals in chains. Another animated Dry Bones?

No, this skeleton is truly dead, and rotten. Foul-smelling, even. But still, the horror, that Father (or one of his forefathers?) would lock up a living creature in here to starve and wither to dust...

He wouldn't do that to me... would he?

I am his son, after all... his precious Crown Prince...

Unless he'd rather have Roy as his Crown Prince... perhaps he promised Clawdia that her boy would be King... Roy is, after all, more representative of the traits that he values; he wants a King who is large, fierce, and physically strong, not a "cultured pansy" such as I...

No... Crown Prince or not, I am still his son. And he wouldn't do this to his own wives, otherwise Lilly would be here...

And he would have tossed me into the lava... or chained me up...

Or maybe he's STARVING ME...

HOW LONG AM I GOING TO BE IN HERE?

I cannot stand not knowing! As stupid as Father is, he would probably forget and leave me in here for too long, thinking that I can tough it out and unintentionally killing me!

This is no way to discipline a young child anyway! A time out in the corner is fine! But this...

I cannot stand not knowing how long I am going to be stuck in here!

For once in my life, I act my age and CRY. I bawl, tears running out of my eyes and my nose, wiping the excess mucus off of my face with my hair. This is not helping, especially since he cannot hear me from the deepest, thickest-walled room of the castle, for crying's only evolutionary purpose is to elicit sympathy from one's caretakers.

Calm down, I tell myself. Do not allow your logic to take backseat to your emotions.

Which is hard, since my emotions come in tidal waves.

This dungeon might be barren, but it is large. Perhaps I will find something worthwhile if I explore a bit...

I wander through the darkest passage I can find, a chamber without lava or torches. It smells not of bones or faint ashes, but of cobwebs and other particulates that would have been swallowed by flames and lava long ago in the other rooms. A large object, likely a table of some sort, is hidden under an enormous filthy tablecloth.

I must see what is underneath. I pull the discolored, dust-laden tablecloth off, not without some difficulty, for the weight added from the dust is immense, and the object underneath makes for some friction. I tug, slowly so as not to knock the object over, to slowly and surely uncover it.

Having tugged the filthy tarp all the way out of the room, I run back in, my heart pounding, anxious to know what it is, and half in fear of disappointment; after all, what could I possibly find in a dungeon that would be worth exploding in excitement over?

The utter irony of that last statement.

My eyelids stretch to the rims, the pupils expanding to take it all in.

My mandible slackens, the lips and tongue now hanging loose.

My cardiovascular system might just collapse.

This object... is the most beautiful thing I have seen since I have been here, the harem's quarters door included.

It is quite possibly the most beautiful thing I have ever seen PERIOD.


	10. Theme Song

Why would anyone... even King Dad... keep something as magnificent as a golden piano stored to gather dust in a dungeon to never be seen, let alone played?

Why would he even have such an instrument in the first place?

I rub my claws over the sparkling veneer, which yields ever so slightly to pressure. Judging by this feel, it is indeed gold - not solid gold, just gilded, but a piano made of solid gold would be quite impractical anyway.

But does it sound as beautiful as it looks?

I leap to the seat and rub my hands across the keys, going up the scales and then down. It is indeed in fine working order, and the notes sound just as sparkling clear as the ones I played on _Mutter's_ piano.

A flowery-looking scrap of paper flutters into the air. I catch it, and read the cursive calligraphy that had been printed on it:

"To My Darling Bride Sofia

From Bowser

Until Death Do Us Part"

As insincere as that final clause was, I am utterly bewildered that Bowser would...

A piano. A golden piano, no less! How... thoughtful of him.

Why did she leave it behind? Did she refuse to accept it since she did not love him, or did she return it when they divorced?

Were they even officially divorced?

Maybe she just left it behind because it would be hard to carry back to Austria.

But certainly she could have arranged for it to be brought home, we have plenty of room for it, unless she was in a hurry to leave? Now I don't blame her for that...

Still, I must wonder, what exactly happened between them? What are they hiding from me?

Perhaps nothing. Bowser does not seem like one who can exercise much subtlety.

Either way, I simply cannot resist the urge to play Mutter's piano any longer!

What shall I play first? Mozart? Beethoven? Chopin?

Or perhaps something original...

The gloominess and foreboding atmosphere had triggered my emotions and musical instincts to work up a sinister tune in my head. A very simple one, but one that very much befits this place.

If one could hear what this dungeon looks and feels like, it would sound like this...

I play the first few notes on the low keys, altering the rhythm and pitches until it sounds JUST RIGHT.

The way it echoes through the dungeon... haunting. Excellent.

But to make it even more chilling...

I play a part with a more rapid tempo on the high keys to harmonize with the deeper part.

I am so into my music that I can scarcely hear anything else...

I feel the pounding of large feet through the floor but I ignore it...

"Kooky? Your time out in the dungeon is over now, you can come out and have dinner..."

My fingers freeze at the sound of_ Vater's_ voice.

"Hey, did you hear that, Kooky? Just a second ago I could have sworn that this dungeon had theme music..."

Seriously? How thick can he be? Oh well, his tone indicates that he is fascinated by the "theme music", and so the theme music shall continue (with pleasure!)

"Hey, listen! Can you hear that? It's playing again! Wow, I didn't know my dungeons had theme music... I guess my dungeons really are amazingly evil! Kooky? Kooky, where are you?"

I play the repetitive tune louder and LOUDER, to make it sound more and MORE terrifying... but I suppose King Bowser really is as fearless as a King should be?

"KOOKY!"

I jump and yelp. HE FOUND ME!

"H-hey, King Dad... that was s-some theme music, h-h-h-huh?"

"So I see you found your mother's piano," he grumbled.

"Yes, I did, and I must ask, WHY is it down here hidden in the basement! That is a travesty! It needs to be out where it can be seen sparkling in the sunlight, to grace your home! It alone would do MUCH to improve the aesthetics of your home decor-"

"What, and have people laugh at me for being a snotty musical sissy?"

Now what sort of degenerate society would be ashamed of such a thing?

"In Austria, you get laughed at for NOT having a piano."

"Well, this isn't Austria! GET OVER IT!"

I flinch at the saliva spray that rains from his mouth, but at least it is not fire.

"By the way, I do like that theme music very much. Where did you learn it?"

"I composed it."

"Heh, no you did not!" Bowser pets my hair roughly in a patronizing gesture. "You know what, I think I should record the music and play it in the dungeons at all times so that whenever some intruder invades they get scared hearing it and head for the hills!"

I glow with pride at the first words of praise for me that my father has uttered in the entire time that I have been here.

"You stay here and practice for a bit longer, I'll go fetch the recorder!"

I begin to play an even higher-pitched version of the song, just to hear how it sounds. I find that the 88th key, the one with the very highest note, does not make a sound. Hmm...

I open the piano lid to see what is wrong with it. There is a folded-up piece of paper caught in the strings. I press the key and watch the mallet bang soundlessly against the paper.

I remove the paper, rewire the strings, and find that the key works just fine now.

I open the piece of paper; seeing that it is folded neatly like a note rather than balled up like trash, it must have been placed in there on purpose.

"To my Dearest Child,

I received this piano as a wedding gift from your father. Unfortunately, I do not have the time or the means by which to carry it home. I do not know what the King will do with it - throw it out, tear it up, give it away, pawn it, return it to whoever he probably stole it from, but I am hoping that he decided to keep it safe somewhere so that you, our child, might find it and rejoice in it someday.

So, _mein liebe_, this gilded piano is all yours. Treasure it, have it taken to a high tower with phenomenal acoustics if you can, I am sure that this piano will bring you many, many MANY hours of enjoyment.

Your Loving _Mutter_,

Sofia von Shellz-Koopa"

Yes, Mutter, I shall. Everything.

Nevertheless, I honestly hope that I do not spend many, many MANY hours here, in this dreary castle...

Please tell me that I won't...?

**In case you were wondering, the song that Ludwig was playing is the castle theme from the original Super Mario Bros.! :D**


	11. Time Deceleration

**OK, I know this is a short chapter... but I'm TIRED tonight, and it's been a while since I've written anything... been too busy tutoring, going out, etc... but there is lots more to come, I promise!**

Woo hoo hoo!

Onkel will be so proud of me!

Unbeknownst to my father, or anyone else in the castle for that matter, I had set up a bit of a laboratory in the dungeon during these final few days I have left in this Hell of sorts. The darkness of the castle dungeon setting has grown on me; I find it has a sort of horrifying, gothic charm to it, that puts me in the right state of mind to come up with brilliantly bizarre scientific ideas. I am no longer stranger to dark, but rather one of the monsters that dwell in it.

My first project is to take apart the television and VCR set to acquire parts to assemble into a crude replica of the time decelerator my Onkel had invented. It would be good practice for my engineering skills, and a test of my resourcefulness, considering what I have to work with. But as Onkel always says, it's not the lab that makes the inventor, but the inventor that makes the lab.

I have memorized the entirety of the blueprints for Onkel's device, watched him build it part by part, even assisting with the assembly, and fully absorbed what Onkel had gone over with me regarding the principles behind it. According to conventional theory, in order to significantly slow time down, an intensive gravitational field must be generated in proximity to the events that one wishes to delay. This, of course, takes a vast amount of energy in order to accomplish, since gravity comes from matter, which takes an energy equal to itself multiplied by the speed of light squared in order to create. And of course, such a gravitational field, if not properly localized, would form a black hole that would destroy the planet.

But my Onkel had found a way around both of these issues, involving a method that "steals time" from another area, which transfers time to make events happen faster in one place and slower in another. So basically, one could use it to simultaneously age cheese a year in seconds and delay the spoilage of fresh produce for years, by stealing time from the cheese to give to the produce, and it takes far less energy than the gravitational method. It was for this breakthrough that Onkel received the much-coveted Frankenstein Prize earlier this year.

Of course, I would receive no such kudos for copying his work, but it would nevertheless be considered quite an accomplishment for a one year old just to be able to assemble such an apparatus.

I had chosen to test it on the eggs that Lilly had left behind after being taken away for rehabilitation for her dependence upon harmful chemicals. I had candled both of them, and although the embryos appear somewhat developmentally impaired, they are both very much alive. Well, at least after delivering a few experimental defibrillative shocks to each of them.

If my experiment is successful, then Lilly will perhaps be out of rehab in time to see the hatching of her offspring. Of course, King Dad must not know about this; I am sure he would vehemently object to my experimenting on my unhatched siblings.

I place the eggs inside the time decelerator, which I had designed to be more akin to an incubator than Onkel's rendition, and just as I close it and turn on the switch, I jump and my hair stands on end as though I had been shocked. It takes a second and a half before I realize that that is not the case.

"KOOKY! IT'S TIME TO GIVE YOUR OLD MAN A GREAT BIG GOODBYE HUG BEFORE YOU LEAVE!"

I had been so absorbed in my work that I had failed to acknowledge until now that today is the day I return to my Mutter's. Luckily, I had designed the time decelerating incubator to be more or less autonomous, so that I would not need to be around to look after it for a while. I wonder how long it will take King Dad to remember the eggs and wonder what happened to them...

So I rise from the bowels of the castle to grudgingly accept a bear hug from my father, and then from Roy, who laughed while attempting to choke me. I follow Kamek onto his broomstick to be flown back to the land of happy clouds and mountains with eyes, to the pipe to Vienna that I had arrived here out of. I willingly hug Kamek goodbye before allowing myself to fall back into the real world.


	12. Not Ready

"MUTTER!"

I pathetically sob tears of joy into her bosom. "I missed you so much and I love you and I never want to leave you or visit that horrible place ever ever again!"

I jump out of her arms and into my Onkel's.

"Oh, come now, he's certainly not that bad, is he?" Onkel asks.

"Um..." I try to think of one nice thing to say about my father. One joyful moment that we had together...

"Well, he likes my music..."

Mutter raises an eyebrow.

"...Some of it, anyway..."

I then hug my grandparents, who seem rather less than gleeful about my return. We celebrate my homecoming with a trip to Cafe Central. I order my favorite, hot chocolate with whipped cream on it.

...

"I believe that it's high time we talk education for the boy," says Wolfgang to his niece.

Sofia sighed as she watched her son, who had moved to another table to play chess with an older stranger. "But Onkel, you know how advanced he is, he is far beyond the level of the average Gymnasium graduate. It would simply be pointless to place him in public or even private school. And he's already been more or less homeschooled..."

"I'm talking UNIVERSITY, my dear!"

"University? Good heavens, Onkel, he is barely a year old!"

"He is more than bright enough for it..."

"Yes, but I'm not sure he's emotionally mature enough for it..."

"Sofia dear, you were only thirteen when you first attended classes..."

"Thirteen YEARS, not MONTHS. Big difference."

"SCHACHMATT!"

Ludwig laughed deviously as he mated his dumbstruck opponent. He jumped onto the table and grabbed the man's ascot. "Now you owe me a Milka bar! Now pay up you deadbeat woodpusher!"

"I shall regret the day that he has his first sip of Kaffee," Sofia muttered.

...

When I return home, I hug the leg of Mutter's piano. It's not the golden one that she left behind at that wretched overlarge hovel, but oh how I missed it!

I had overhead my Mutter and Onke discussing my future while at the Kaffeehaus. Something about... university.

Hmm, why am I not in university already? As smart as I am, I should already be a graduate!

"MUTTER!"

"Yes _liebling_?"

"I want you to enroll me in university right now!"

"SPLENDID!" cries Onkel. "Now, you want to go to Frankenstein like your dear old Onkel, not University of Vienna like your Mutti-"

"Onkel!" Mutter rebukes him. "First of all, _mein Sohn_, that is no way to ask for what you want. We are ladies and gentlemen; we say bitte. Rude etiquette might have been accepted at your father's house, but you are not there anymore."

"Thank goodness," I mutter. "Ok, then..."

I clear my throat. "Dearest Mutter, would you be so kind as to enroll me in university,_ bitte_?"

"Ludwig, it is not that simple..."

"ARE YOU KIDDING?" Onkel interrupts. "Once they see the kid's IQ scores they'll be BEGGING him to attend!"

"At his age, I should think not-"

"Quit holding him back if he wants to go!"

"ONKEL!"

Mutter's eyes flame with a rage that seldom shows from beneath her soft-spoken demeanor. Onkel understands, nods and withdraws from the conversation.

"Ludwig, why must you be in such a rush to attend? After all, you are only one year old..."

"So? Is this about me not being old enough for discussion of sexual matters? Because I already know all about how the reproductive system works-"

"No, no, dear, it's... you see, succeeding at university takes more than just... intelligence."

"What does it take? Height? Physical strength? Fully developed gonads? Because whatever it takes, I will invent something to enable me to have it!"

"Ludwig, no, it doesn't take anything like that... you can, in theory, invent a way to accelerate growth and aging, but you can't invent a way to make yourself emotionally ready."

"YES I CAN!" I am beginning to become frustrated, because I know that she is going to say no in the end and make me wait until I am the same age as everybody else - or OLDER (THE HORROR!) "It's all a matter of finding the biochemical basis for emotionally mature and stable behavior-"

"Ludwig, you have your whole life ahead of you, at least wait until puberty..."

"NEIN! I WANT TO MAKE IT INTO THE GUINNESS BOOK OF WORLD RECORDS FOR YOUNGEST PERSON EVER TO EARN A UNIVERSITY DEGREE! AND LOTS OF GENIUSES DIE YOUNG AND YOU NEVER KNOW, THAT MIGHT HAPPEN TO ME AND ONLY A UNIVERSITY EDUCATION WOULD HAVE SAVED ME! AND YOU KNOW WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT EARLY RIPE AND EARLY ROT, AT THE RATE MY INTELLECT IS GROWING I WILL HAVE DEMENTIA BEFORE I'M TWENTY YEARS OLD!"

Mutter sits upon the piano seat and interrupts me with a discordant bang on the keys.

"LUDWIG CALM DOWN THOSE NOTIONS ARE LUDICROUS!"

I stand still, shaking with the urge to do something violent. I sniff, tears dribbling out of my nose and eyes down my rage-heated face.

Mutter leans over me to wipe my face with her soft linen handkerchief. "What I'm trying to say is... university is... well, you know how they say that genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration?"

"I disagree, the percentage of inspiration has to be higher..."

"Well, university is ninety-nine percent... actually, I would say ONE HUNDRED percent perspiration. You will be obligated to do lots of hard work, and... not that you will find it difficult so much as... exhausting. Tedious, even. You will have too much busy work to do and be too exhausted to learn and develop your skills at your own rapid pace, and it will frustrate you, and at your age you might not be willing or able to put up with that - I mean, look at you, having a tantrum over such a small matter..."

"Mutter..." I had to admit, her reasoning was sound. But then, that would only be natural for me to have at least ONE intelligent parent.

"Now, there are plenty of things that you can do to stimulate and challenge yourself without going to university. We still have much of Europe left to travel. You haven't even seen all of Vienna."

"Mutter, I want-"

"And maybe we'll see about getting you to play at coffeehouses, maybe even for concerts... OH! And we've got to have you try out for the Vienna Boys' Choir..."

Ach. Choir.

"Very well" I mumble, still not fully resigned from my intentions to go to university.

"Oh, and Ludwig, at your age you need your legal parent or guardian to sign for permission for you to attend, so don't even think about forging it."

Scheisse. Oh well, maybe Onkel can sign it...

"And that goes for you too, Wolfgang Amadeus. You are his great uncle, not his legal parent or guardian."

Oh well. I hop onto the piano seat. I briefly consider playing for them the song that I played in Vater's dungeon, but seeing that HE actually liked it, it would probably not be to the maternal family's taste, so I decide to compose something less Darklandish and more Viennese.

...

Sofia's eyes exuded tears as she listened to her son compose a song of heartwrenching despair almost instantaneously.

"You know, at first I thought I wanted a genius child," Sofia said, almost to herself, though her parents were well within earshot. "But having Ludwig made me realize... I just want a child."

Josephine shook her head. "Holding the boy back... this is clearly in your interest, not his."

"He is growing up fast, faster than the normal child, which grows fast enough. It won't be long before he's gone..."

Wilhelm patted his daughter on the back. "Perhaps it is best that you tell him."

"I... don't have the heart to..."


	13. Kaffee and Cough Syrup

"You're in for a special treat, mein kleiner Boltzmann!"

Surrounding coffeehouse patrons stared as Wolfgang clutched his diaphragm, shaking, apparently suffocating from his manic cackling.

"Is he all right ma'am?" Sofia was asked by the waiter who presented the family with their orders.

"Yes, he's actually fairly calm today." Sofia sighed as she watched the waiter present her son with a Doppelmokka.

"Onkel, I thought we agreed that he was not to have coffee-"

"Until he's in college!" Wolfgang finished for his niece, winking at the four-year-old, who had just been accepted into an experimental accelerated baccalaureate degree program at Frankenstein University.

"Well, when I came up with that agreement, I was expecting that he would at least have reached adolescence by then."

"Ach, Sofie, don't tell me you buy into those old wives' tales about caffeine stunting a child's growth! Why, I suckled java out of the bottle the day I was hatched and look, I'm the tallest one in the family!"

Sofia coughed while mumbling something into her handkerchief, and Ludwig stared into the swan swirled out of the foam atop his Mokka.

...

My lungs deeply drink in the beautiful, forbidden aroma that had teased me many a time as I sat in the coffeehouse prudishly sipping my hot cocoa milk, now presented before me, courtesy of Onkel. The way it smells, the way the perfume causes warm shivers to pulse through my heart... it feels so right, so wholesome, as though a deeper instinct, perhaps as deep as my cellular organelles, is calling for it.

I had never tasted more than a finger dip from my mother's Melange. I lift the glass toward my face, but then a sudden memory flashes into my brain and I freeze.

"O-Onkel, caff-ffeine is a... a-a stimu-mu-mu-mulant d-d-d-d-drug, rrrright?"

"Ja," my Mutter replied curtly, but Onkel laughed and said,

"Technically, yes, but a GOOD one! Why, the great city of Wien was practically built on Kaffee! Our scientists, mathematicians, chess players, novelists, artists and musicians, they were all able to do what they did thanks to the power of caffeine! Now drink up, trust me, you're going to be wanting it when you get to Frankenstein!"

So... caffeine is a drug that... promotes productivity? Then surely it must be a GOOD drug, not like whatever kind of debilitating stimulant cocktails Lilly was on...

I sip, and savor the rich, complex flavor. Such a savory bitterness, complemented by notes of cream, sugar and cacao, I revel in the wonder that so many simple flavors can combine to create something that is more than the sum of its parts.

Just like music, or any art... or chemistry...

A few more sips and I can feel the chemistry taking action on me.

I feel a sort of energy in my chest, an energy that wants to explode out and will if I continue to sit still. My fingers are the first to feel the pulse quickening through their delicate veins; they twitch, with a nimbleness that would enable me to play piano twice as fast, but with a mental clarity that would endow me with twice the precision (oh how I wish I had discovered this sooner, otherwise I might have placed first in the International Chopin Piano Competition instead of sixth...) My eyes... they feel bigger, wider, more protrusive, more alert to all of the glorious decor that the Kaffeehaus exhibits, paintings and glassware and the cobblestone streets shining through the windows...

I burst out in laughter - over nothing, except the sheer euphoria that the caffeine had triggered in me. Oh wait... suddenly EVERYTHING seems funny! Memories of being yelled at by my father all those years ago, my Onkel's swirly goggles, that crisp Apfelstrudel that Mutter has hardly touched (and which I don't hesitate to wolf down), the little glass of water they served me with my Mokka... that painting of Emperor Franz and Empress Sissi on the wall, those patzers shoving wood at each other over the chessboard on the table across from me, the article in the newspaper about the Eastern Bloc the man in another adjacent tabe is reading, the fact that the newspaper is in Hungarian, the fact that I can read Hungarian...

But what seems funniest of all is the Chopin's Nocturne that the lady at the piano is playing. Pfft, I can play better than her! Not that her playing isn't lovely, of course, but I should be the one playing! I do after all have plenty of experience playing at coffeehouses and concerts and I want to play right now why my fingers are still this... TWITCHY!

"Ludwig, calm down!" My Mutter fails to grab me off the table. I bounce over the tables, knocking over my water glass in the process, burning my foot by stepping into somebody's Brauner but I laugh it off. I bounce on top of the piano, making a tremendous discordant BANG over the keys (which I find funny rather than abrasive in my current state) and shove the lady aside to take the keys.

"WOOHOOHOO! This is a little song I would like to dedicate to - actually, woohoo, I can't think of anybody to dedicate it to! So I'm just going to dedicate it to a Frau Kaffee! WOOHOOHOOO FRAU KAFFEE!"

Amazing how funny an unfunny joke (or non-joke?) can be when you're high on stimulants.

What I play sounds like a very sped-up version of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. I sing made-up lyrics off the top of my head, and not that I don't have a lovely voice (I do in fact), but it's not often that I desire to use it for song.

The reaction I get is very mixed. My mother is clearly furious at my behavior, but my Onkel, and several others in the audience, applaud and laugh. I don't understand how they can't all be laughing and twitching, I mean, some of them have downed cup after cup of Kaffee!

Which reminds me... I need more Kaffee myself!

Mutter grabs me by the hair and drags me - and Onkel too for that matter - toward the entrance.

"Mutter, one more cup, please?"

Mutter points at the water glass I have spilled.

"WAHAHAHA, you can only continue to refill on Kaffee as long as your water glass is full, boy!" Onkel explains.

...

"Onkel, I want more! MORE! Please tell me they have Kaffee at Frankenstein University!"

"Eehhh, that they do, mein Boltzmann, but I'm not sure it's exactly what you would call Kaffee... German coffee is not quite as good as ours, see, they make it mostly through the drip filter process... buuuut, put lots of sugar and cream in it and it should taste ok!"

Mutter is driving the car up to Germany, and we pass through the town of Fucking.

"Onkel! Did you know that Fucking is a swear word in English?"

"Oh, is it? Well that would explain why it sounds similar to fick!"

"ONKEL!"

My Mutter shouts, and my Onkel laughs.

"So, imagine if there were a town called FICK in Dark Land, then annoying tourists from here would come swarming to it!"

"LUDWIG!"

"Mutter, I'm a college student now, I can curse if I want to!" I pout and fold my arms under the belt to my booster seat.

"Just because you can does not mean you should. You are a young gentleman and are expected to behave as such. If you behave this way, and like you did at the Kaffeehaus while attending university, you will be expelled."

"They can't expel me, they wouldn't dare, I'm too FUCKING brilliant!"

Onkel and I laugh together; that's ONE word of English he now knows.

Mutter sighs. "I thought your father's influence on you would have worn off after almost three years..."

"Eh, try as you might, you can't change what's in the DNA!" says Onkel.

"Well..." Mutter slows down the car. "I'm not sure if four months is long enough to change that..."

"Four years crammed into one semester! He'll have the time of his life, won't you?" Onkel ruffles my hair.

"I'm not sure if he can handle it... I'm not sure if any living being, quite frankly, can consolidate that much into their neurons in such a short time period..."

"Which is why they created this program to see if it's possible! There is absolutely no shame should he fail, I mean, even if you can't do it in one semester you can certainly do it given another one, right?"

"Absolutely, Onkel! WOOHOOHOO!"

A while later, some time after Mutter has crossed the border, I become bored.

"MUTTER I'M BORED!"

"Read your textbooks then."

"I have already read them all!"

"Well, then, read them all again to make sure you haven't forgotten anything."

"But that's BORING! Obviously I haven't forgotten anything if I am bored with reading them again."

"Work on your Rubik's cube."

"Solved it."

"Onkel, would you keep him entertained? Discuss science with him or something. Or give him something to make him sleep... scratch that..."

Onkel snickered and reached into his bag. "Don't worry, it's just a children's cough syrup..."

Mmm, cough syrup. But knowing Onkel, it was probably something else...

"Onkel...?"

He pulled out an unlabeled vial of a viscous purple fluid.

"Wh-what brand is that?"

"Why, it's MY brand, that's what! I've created my own line of over-the-counter pharmaceuticals, and they have worked fine so far on my human test subjects, but I have yet to test it on a koopa."

"Why d-don't you test it on yourself?"

"Why? Because if it does what it's supposed to do, I will be too drowsy to know it!"

"Onkel! Now, you know that a medication for sedating children will never pass approval for the market!"

"Sure it will! Wahaha, you just have to label it as for the treatment of something else, and then once parents find out it knocks their children out they will buy it for off-label purposes! Now I also need you to taste-test it for me, my boy."

I tentatively sniff the contents of the vial. Mmmm... cough syrup.

Not knowing what Onkel had put in it, I am nevertheless drooling for the sugar and addictive medicinal flavor.

"Ludwig, whatever your Onkel gives you, don't accept..."

"But Mutter, I do have a cough!" I fake cough a couple of times.

I grab the vial and suck all forty milliliters of it down.

"Mmmmmmm... Onkel do you have any cough drops? Yummy yummy... cough drops..."

"Well, look on the bright side, Sophie dear, at least he's not bouncing up and down on caffeine anymore!"

I am probably poisoned by whatever he gave me, but somehow I just... don't... caaarrreee...

ZZZZZzzzzz...


	14. Frankenstein Diaries, part one

"Wake up, Ludwig! HEHEHE we're here now!"

"Where..." I feel disoriented and groggy, and my throat feels itchy and clogged. I open my reluctant eyelids to view Onkel as Mutter carries me through the darkness toward a castle.

"Frankenstein, my boy!"

"Oh, riii..."

My throat is choked up with irritating phlegm. I cough until, like with scratching, the itching goes away.

"Onkel, I think I really need some of that cough syrup now..."

"Tut tut, my Boltzmann, you shouldn't have drunk the entire bottle! I'm afraid it would do nothing to HELP your condition anyway..." Onkel covered his mouth and put his other hand to his diaphragm to repress the pressure from the laugh that was beginning to snort out.

"But it's cough... syrup..."

"WAHAHAHAHA! That's exactly right, my boy, COUGH syrup! Specially formulated to MAKE you cough!"

"ONKEL!" Mutter rebukes. But Onkel exploded with laugher and continued to do so until I feared that he would asphyxiate himself.

Splendid. I shall spend my first day... or week or however long the 'medicine' lasts... of university coughing and sick.

"Onkel, exactly how long will this condition last?"

"Eeeehhh" Onkel twiddles his fingers sheepishly. "Only a couple of hours, but, uh, that was the human test subjects, and they didn't drink a dose quite as large as yours... I'd reckon... a week."

"Please tell me you have a cure, Onkel. I cannot be sick for my first week of university... for this hyper-accelerated program, it's the equivalent of being sick for two solid months!"

Onkel went back to rolling around in his shell, laughing.

"Onkel?"

"Woohoohoohoohooweeheeheehee..."

"ONKEL!"

"Teeheehee... WaaAAHAHAHA... take it easy boy, that formula didn't make you sick any more than cough suppressing syrup makes you not sick! You see, anti-cough syrup only treats the symptoms, not the underlying disease. My formula gives you the symptoms but not the disease, so you're still perfectly well, you're just hacking like crazy for no reason like the actors in those Robitussin commercials! GET IT?"

Actually... I do. Onkel's joke here is... BRILLIANT! I begin aching at the sides out of laughter myself.

"WOO HOO HOO! That was a good one, Onkel!"

Mutter sighs. "I will never understand your sense of humor, you two..."

I shall have to get back at Onkel, of course. Perhaps a no tears shampoo that contains no anti-lacrimal benefits but toughens your scalp so that it cannot be torn off of your skull no matter how hard one tries... or tangle-free hair spray that supplies you with free tangles, that is, not included in the price of purchasing the bottle and aqua filler... oh wait, he wouldn't get those jokes; they don't translate too well into his single speaking tongue.

But I'll be sure to have plenty of great ideas after I'm through with Frankenstein University! Onkel had told me so many funny and exciting stories about his time there, both his tenure and his student days... I must wonder why Mutter is no longer trying to push me to go to University of Vienna, her alma mater, instead?

Of course, Mutter has to hug me and cry...

"Mutter, would you PLEASE release me, you've had me in your arms for two solid minutes..."

"All right... I shall..." Her pressure on my shell loosens, and her hands crawl over to mine, which she grips while staring into my eyes as if to show me how swamped in lacrimal ooze hers are.

"I really don't want to... " she half whispers "...let you go..."

"But you have to."

"Indeed, I do..."

Ach. WHY all the drama! I'm going to university, for heaven's sake, not to another universe! And only for four months, which is far shorter than most students have to go there!

But then, I am to go to grad school immediately afterwards, and that may take considerably longer...

Onkel ruffles my hair roughly with his claws; perhaps a no tears shampoo might be practical after all? "Have a fun time in school, kid! And don't forget to write - wait, scratch that, you're going to be EIGHT times busier than the average Frankenstein student! You'll have plenty of time to get caught up after the four months are over! Don't sleep, well maybe a couple of hours or so on the weekends, but the rest of the time stay up, and drink lots and LOTS of Kaffee!"

No bedtime and lots of Kaffee... I think I am going to love Frankenstein University!

...

Day One:

Danke for reading, my hypothetical audience. I say hypothetical because this is my personal journal of my experiences at Frankenstein U. and because it is personal nobody is going to read it, that is, nobody except for me and the hypothetical audience inside my head. Woo hoo hoo the thought of writing to entertain the peoples in my head cracks me up! Or maybe that's just the five cups of Kaffee I had - maybe my tastes aren't too refined, having had Austrian Kaffee only once, but Onkel was wrong about German Kaffee not being good!

I am writing this after moving my belongings into my dorm. The ambience of this room is actually similar to that of my Vater's castle, except better-furnished. I should hope so, considering the cost of residency. I got a full scholarship of course, and I am only staying here for the equivalent of one semester. If other individuals were capable of learning at such a pace, then even the finest univesities would be affordable for even the poorest of them.

Yes, stupidity is too often a tax, that is certain... but my young brain is doused with adenosine and melatonin, not to mention whatever was in that cough syrup Onkel tested on me, and I can no longer ponder such matters with sufficient lucidity. I imagine taking some more Kaffee would help with that, but seeing as I will be going into major sleep debt over the next four months, I must sleep while I still can.

Day Two:

I pick up my schedule and receive my course load for the next sixteen weeks. Each week I will concentrate on a single course, during which I will be expected to study the weekend beforehand.

My courseload for the coming week is all on Matematik. Good to get that out of the way first so that when the students get to the sciences they can do them at the highest level of mathematical sophistication.

I read the description and find out about my assignments: homework problems from the first ten chapters of that math book I already read.

H-homework?

I have to write out the steps and the answers using pencil and paper.

Isn't being able to do it in my head enough?

There goes my weekend. I was going to spend it composing a violin concerto, or maybe inventing something...  
>!<p>

I shall hold that last thought... but first I must run out and get a Kaffee.

Day Three:

Can't write too much. Busy working on an invention to do my homework.

Is that cheating? Why yes, technically, but by any reasonable standard of ethics NO. I am not cheating myself, since I already know how to do the problems; I couldn't build something that can do the problems if I didn't, now, could I?

Plus, this way I am killing two birds with one stone, so to speak. By the time I get to my Engineering class, I will already have that term's assignment done!

Need... more... Kaffee...

Day Four:

I have recently finished my homework completion invention, and it is a success. I cannot let the professor know about it though; he or she might not see things the same way I do...

Must... rest before first day of classes... oh look at that, it's already Day Five! No rest this week I guess... oh well a perfect excuse to have another Kaffee!

Day Five:

I expected the classroom to be humongous, but it is actually quite small. I guess because we are an elite group; you have to have an IQ of at least 200 to qualify for the program. My IQ was measured to be 343, but I believe that is a gross underestimation...

Anyway, the professor is a short, rotund human, with a zany, mad scientist look to her. First thing she asked the class to do is turn in our homework.

I was the only one who managed to finish it all. Right after the professor patted me on the shell for turning it all in, a girl with brown hair and a phony-looking smile on her face who introduced herself as Erika raised her hand and said that she had caught me using a machine to do my homework.

The professor asked me if I created the machine myself and I gave her the honest truth, that yes, I did. The professor decided that I deserve extra credit for that!

I smirked at Erika. She struggled to hold that eerie grimace of hers. I could tell she was turning red with jealousy because she not only failed to do all the homework, but what she had done was all incorrect.

There is no way that she tests anywhere near the 200 mark. Her parents must have gotten her in.

Well, this calls for a celebration! And what better way to celebrate than with Kaffee!

Day Eight:

I apologize for not having written in three days; I was swamped this week. The professor assigned more and more homework and gave out additional readings. Class, which involves much active discussion and lively debate, lasts all day except for a brief lunch break, during which I study while nibbling on fries and candy bars and sipping on Kaffee. My health will probably suffer from such a diet, but I believe such an issue can be resolved with the invention of a pill that contains all of the health benefits of vegetables but none of the yuckiness. That shall be one of my projects for next week, when I shall be undertaking Intro to Mad Science.

According to the course description in the handbook, Intro to Mad Science covers basic quantum mechanics, general relativity, biochemistry, biophysics, chemical physics, molecular genetics, thermodynamics, temporal dynamics, macromechanics (**the study of how micro-scale physics affects events on the larger, classical scale**), nanotechnology, computer science, and robotics, and explores creative ways to apply these principles for the purpose of invention.

Quite a learning curve I must say. I really should be studying, even though this week's classes are all over. Grades were just announced this evening after grading the final exams, and I, of course, got an A. The rest of the class earned barely passing marks, except for Erika, who failed and ran out crying.

Or maybe I should just rest... but instead I am celebrating my high marks with an extra large, extra-chocolatey helping of Kaffee!

Day Nine:

Can't write... too busy inventing... and studying... and injecting my gullet with Kaffee...

Day Ten:

More... studying...

More... _Kaffee_...


	15. Frankenstein Diaries, part two

Day… One (again)

No I didn't flunk out of university and start all over. I mean day one since I started writing again. I haven't written in… three months? Yes I know it's ironic that a child that can build a machine that does math homework should be unable to calculate how many days they have been in school, but see, my mind has been so busy with so many other things, trying to stuff them into my long-term memory in such a short period of time, that I cannot spare a nanoerg of brain energy toward something as trivial as what day it is. To tell the truth I have lost all track even of what time of year it is. Let's see… it's foggy and green outside… Spring perhaps? But what month? Oh but Bavaria looks like this year round anyway, except maybe during the winter, provided it isn't a warm winter…

Well today I decided to take a much-needed breather, hence my writing in my journal again. To help the reader who is not reading this catch up, I have aced every class I have taken so far these past three months. I suppose there is no shame in admitting that I had to work VERRRRRY hard at it, given how easy everything is for me naturally, but some part of me likes for it to be hard. Not in a way that I should dumb myself down to make it artificially hard for me, no, that would just be… a travesty I guess?

Anyway, I remember everything I have learned these past months. I doubt the other students do, seeing that they are in the habit of cramming all of the knowledge into short-term memory, and rotely I might add as opposed to completely understanding everything, just long enough so that they can pass the test.

In addition to the usual battery of science and engineering classes, I have taken "liberal arts" classes, which are required at all proper universities around the world regardless of field of study. Mainly music classes, for I am concentrating in music as well, but also writing, languages, literature, art, and history. I have learned some fascinating things in history class, about the relationship between the universe of my father's origin, known as the "Mushroom Universe" thanks to it being largely dominated by the Mushroom Kingdom, and the "real world" that this school is quite ironically located in. Apparently my species is native to the other universe, but certain oppressive events, instigated by the Crown of Dark Land (what a surprise) have spurred a mass migration of the more intelligent of my race to the real world. Apparently they have cast a spell that, to humans, makes us indistinguishable in appearance from humans in this world.

I inquired to learn more about the magical arts, but apparently they are not taught here…

So here I am, reading out of a clockwork mechanics book, assembling a robot, and penning a symphony at the same time. I have to get an original symphony done for my musical composition class, and perform it as well, which will require robotic instrument players to play the thirty other parts in the orchestra. Luckily I had this symphony already written, when I was 39 months old to be exact; I am merely straining (not fruitlessly, mind you, thank heavens) to remember every note that I had written down…

Day Two since writing again:

I actually slept last night, for four full hours. I feel so refreshed; it's the first sleep I've had in what feels like ages. Last night the robots and I performed for my music composition class, and I am somewhat nervous about my grade… students are dropping out of the program like flies, and despite having scored perfectly on everything so far, I fear that the strength of mind that has seen me through these past three months will eventually crack and I will not only score a substandard grade, but become the next casualty… I must keep myself calm, by telling myself that this line of thinking is irrational. I do after all know what good music is, and I cannot think of any flaws to speak of in that I or the robots committed in that performance of last night… but then again, perhaps my thinking is impaired by the lack of sleep, firehose pressure of the knowledge I am attempting to absorb, and consumption of caffeine by the gramful…

It is lunch right now, and I am writing this while drinking my seventh cup of Kaffee for the day, a delicious blended ice Mokka, hence the brown stains on this paper. I should be studying for next week's class… but first I must remember what next week's class is.

A sealed envelope addressed to yours truly has presently been dropped over my tray of French fries. Heart pounding, fingers trembling, and not just from the near-toxic levels of caffeine that I have antagonizing my every adenosine receptor, I gingerly tear it open.

I passed my music composition class.

With top marks and a glowing recommendation to the school's M.F.A. of Mad Music program by the professor…

A tidal wave of relief crashes over me, nearly stopping my heart. I let the letter float down into the fries and watch as the parchment absorbs a greasy spot of hollandaise sauce.

Maybe I should… just relax and gather my thoughts some. Mutter has always warned me not to allow my genius to get to my head, but the more and more I find that I am capable of, the more and more confident I become… or is confident the right word, rather than arrogant?

I pack the letter away with the others, and decide to engage in some activity that is less mentally strenuous.

Such as playing chess with some patzers over on the crowded lunch table across from mine. Too easy. After all, I am only 12 Elo points away from being the youngest grandmaster in history.

Too bad I can't join the chess club. Or the theater club. Or the robotics club. Or any of the other fun student organizations and activities that this school has to offer. I'm too busy speeding through school, I'm afraid. But hah, who needs any of that when you have a degree!

Day… errr last day before finals:

Tensions are up. So many students have dropped out of the program that there is talk of cancelling it.

They had BETTER NOT! I have worked too damn hard these past four months for them to take that away because a load of idiots drowned trying to drink through a firehose! I may have permanently damaged my sense of sanity for the purpose of making history, and who are THEY not to let me make it!

Oh wait, scratch that last paragraph. They aren't going to cancel it if any students make it past this semester. They will just discontinue it for semesters to come.

I am drinking a liter-sized mug of pure strong espresso, with some chocolate mixed in. Not enough I should say. I shall take that up with the barista, and heaven have mercy on them should they give me lip, for I am teetering on the fine edge between perfect sanity and suddenly SNAPPING…

Back. The barista did her job and added just the right amount of chocolate to my drink. Now where was I…

Oh yes. Tomorrow is the cumulative finals. Students will be tested on everything they learned these past four months. That's an awful lot to cram into the short term memory, and I hear the other students griping loads about it.

All two of them.

But unlike them, I shall do no cramming today. Today I shall relax and meditate, exercise off the caffeine jitters with some ballet and then settle down to play a lovely hypnotic melody on the violin, and just clear my mind so I don't spaz out on the test as I see the other students do.

Sorry, sorry individuals… cramming is in my book nothing more than a legal method of cheating, and a very ineffective one at that. If my suspicion is correct, they will be sorry…

I have just finished my mug. I bid this log farewell for now, for when I next write in here it will be after Armageddon – I mean finals of course.

FINALS DAY:

I am taking a brief moment away from packing to let this all out while it is all still so raw in my mind.

Finals… were they a nightmare?

YES.

The jury is still out for my status as of yet, but I can safely say that the other two have, in terms of the aforementioned metaphor, died in their sleep.

First of all, they had decided to use their pioneering new advance in educational technology on us: a machine that had been designed to clear all of the cramming out of one's short term memory. I smirk, having suspected this of happening, having assisted my own Groβonkel in the design. I believe it will do a great service to the professional world by weeding out those undesirables, those that care more about passing than learning anything!

The two of them… a boy and a girl, both human, I forget their names… well I could feel the tension emanating from the boy one. He was only an hour into the 1000 question free answer test when he slammed his fists on the desk, screamed and ran out of the room, clutching his hair and pricking at his cranium.

How weak.

The girl seemed rather quiet though. I wondered, maybe she's almost as smart as me?

I darted a brief glance in her direction to catch that she was typing like mad into her calculator. Perhaps I should have brought a calculator… not that I needed it to do even the most exhausting of arithmetic, but it would have made it go along rather faster…

My thoughts were interrupted when the proctor raised himself from the desk and walked toward me.

NERVES NERVES NERVES NERVES NERVES…

No he had actually gotten up to see what that girl was up to. I winced as I tried to block it out… all I got is that she was somehow using that calculator to cheat off of me and so she was escorted out of the testing room.

What a relief. I had always feared that I might be accused of cheating, even though I would never do such a thing, being that first of all, I am more intelligent and knowledgeable than anybody I know, so it would be pointless, and secondly, to do so would be a blow against my own pride – arrogance, what ever you would call it.

Well after I had finished all 1000 of the questions… having answered EVERY SINGLE ONE, and written at least ten pages in response to each of the essay questions - OH MY ACHING HANDS it's a good thing I'm ambidextrous… I went to the bathroom to release what I had been holding for… too many hours… and I refilled on Kaffee, which I heated in the microwave to remove some of its water content so that I wouldn't be distracted with a full bladder for the second half of the test, and French fries with extra sodium chloride sprinkled on them, the purpose for that being to further counteract the caffeine's diuretic effect.

I was shocked to see that the moon was out outside. A full moon too. Night already?

So the next half of the test, which lasted ALL NIGHT, was the practical portion of the test, and it involved building things, writing computer programs, creating and testing compounds… I knew how to do everything by heart, it was just very, VERY tiring… sometimes I wonder if it's possible to overexercise one's brain, just as that Schwarzenegger person that used to live in my country overexercises his own muscles; they say that, analogously to the case for muscles, that exercise is good for the brain, but if too much physical exercise can cause heart attacks, asthma attacks and muscle sprains, can too much mental exercise cause, say, brain damage, aneurysms, or stroke? If anybody should ever be lucky enough to find out, it would be me…

Anyway, yes I'm dead tired, my hands hurt, I am absolutely desiccated from the high caffeine to fluid ratio I have put myself on, I have a headache, I will probably fail so I don't know whether or not to order the midget-size graduation cap and gown, and I have to pack for, graduation or not, school's over and I'm leaving… I'm sure my Mutter will be proud of me either way, but I am afraid I won't feel so proud of myself if I did indeed fail.

I am going to pass out like a light bulb with a worn out tungsten filament any minute now…

Knocking. Damn no adrenaline left in me to make me perk up from the sound…

I answer the door.

Oh hey it's my final grades.

I rip open the sealed envelope.

I passed.

Scored 100 percent on everything plus extra credit. Wow I didn't even know this school even offered extra credit… I guess I really am that special.

I am ENTITLED to let it get to my head. Not that I will…

But of course I would score perfectly and then some. I should have kn

Graduation Day:

This is funny. This is really, really funny. A graduation ceremony with only one graduate.

Pardon that last entry by the way. It would appear I had fallen into sudden slumber before finishing that last word.

Anyway, yes I am graduating today, and because there is only one graduate it will be a rather short ceremony, with fewer guests than usual.

Also, being the only graduate at this ceremony makes me the valedictorian by default.

And I have yet to prepare a speech…

I'll bet they're all expecting me to wing it and make up the speech as I go along. After all, I must be fast if I could get through four years' worth of university in four months.

Which every other applicant had failed to do…

But not me. Somehow, not only did I pass, I EXCELLED.

It must be true, then. I am no ordinary creature, I am exceptional among the exceptional, and even THAT is an understatement.

I put on my robe, which is black lined with blue and lime green, and then the mortarboard, making sure the tassel is hanging on the left side for now, as tradition dictates.

I look out the window, down upon all of the folks that are waiting for me.

My Mutter, my Onkel, my grandparents, perhaps a few other family members that I am not too familiar with, the university's faculty, and, as it would appear, a good portion of the student body…

All of them expecting a speech, and not just any speech, but the finest speech they have ever had the pleasure of listening to.

All of them waiting, for me, and ONLY me.

And now… it hits me.

Yes, as fast as I was able to learn all of the mathematics and science and language and everything else that was part of the curriculum, the greater lesson to it all is only just now beginning to sink in.

These people… all of the people in the world, for that matter… and the other world I have had the displeasure of becoming acquainted with nearly four years ago… they are under my utter and absolute power.

Their happy existence is all dependent upon the fact that I have not yet chosen to annihilate them all in ways that they could not even imagine.

Yes, I alone hold the power to do great good or great evil… their lives hang in the balance of my choices.

I can save them from certain disaster… or steer them toward certain doom. It is all a matter of my choice.

Or I can choose to simply sequester all of this power that I hold, rather than exercise it.

But even then, the fact that I HOLD such power would be enough to affect the actions and wills of those around me; all that know of my power will fear it, admire it, covet it, envy it, spite it…

In short, I was, as used to be said, born in the purple – in more ways than one, mind you, but the definition that I presently indicate is the one that states that I have been born with a great gift, a great responsibility, a great burden to bear.

I can – and I WILL – set the course of history. In fact, I have the brainpower to create that which can CHANGE history.

I am… well the closest thing to a deity my… underlings will ever see on this earth. So I shall fear nothing… nothing except myself.

I shall no longer fear that I myself may be too weak… but rather, from this day forth, that I may be too strong…

I snap out of this epiphany as the school's band begins to practice "Props and Circumstances".

Good heavens, why am I dawdling?! I… could just ramble on and on and on like I do in this diary and it will still be the finest speech that would ever resonate in their eardrums.

Yes. I am now ready to make my speech.

I will have to be pardoned, however, if I come across as _somewhat arrogant_.


	16. Aber Vorsicht

**REVIEWS! Urm, not to be a reviews whore… ok just this once for the hell of it:**

**If I get at least three reviews on this chapter I'll change my username to the name my cat uses on some of the websites he frequents for a week!**

**Yes, my cat uses the internet too. If you think your cat doesn't sneak onto the internet while you're gone, or take over your mind and run his/her internet business using your body, you're only fooling yourself.**

Today is a lovely day.

Well, truth be told, every day is a lovely day so long as it's fortified with the splendor of good Kaffee.

Mutter was quite baffled that I decided that I wanted to celebrate my graduation at a Kaffeehaus.

"My mistake, I thought you would have tired of Kaffee after drinking yourself into an addiction…"

Actually, the first thing I did upon returning home from the University was pass out, dead asleep. I woke up about forty-eight hours later.

And that's when the family took me out to celebrate – after an onslaught of forced grooming, of course. Mutter couldn't believe that I hadn't showered for the entire four months that I was at Frankenstein, not even to look nice for commencement.

So here I am now at Café Central drinking every kind of Kaffee I see on the menu. Melanges with lovely latte art such as swans, hearts, leaves; Mokkas with whipped cream on top, Eiskaffees with vanilla bean ice cream scooped on top… is it just me, or do these beverages taste even better than the ones at Frankenstein University's Kaffeehaus? Wait, that goes without saying, this is, after all, VIENNESE Kaffee!

I hear my grandmother complaining to Mutter about my state of hyperness…

"How can you let him just drink as much caffeine as that? The boy needs sleep, his growing brain cannot handle such sleep deprivation! My studies have shown-"

"He'll be fine, Mutter, if he's anything like Wolfgang, and you know he is… today, he can have as much as he wants."

That had better be right. I just graduated Frankenstein University with perhaps the greatest honors ever, I deserve as much as I want!

Mutter is still on her second Melange, staring into the foam and twiddling the spoon through it. I have never understood why she has never been so keen to drink as much as I… and Onkel Wolfgang, for that matter.

Well, actually, Onkel is conversing with the Kaffee right now. It's rather amusing to watch, I must admit.

"Guten Weinachten Herr Brauner! My first order of business is to ask if you are actually a Herr or a Frau Brauner…"

Onkel writes some illegible word salad over his stained napkin. He taps his spoon on the cup of Brauner, speaking in a falsetto as he made a constant tinkling noise.

"I am not Herr or Frau I am a pretty little girl! Pretty girl teehee! I wear bows and ribbons of magnesium burn with purple convexity with a refractive index of 2 point 42 degrees Fahrenheit does it?"

Onkel drops the spoon into the Brauner, further staining his napkin, and speaks in an artificially deep voice.

"Uh oh! Somebody has the WAHAHAHAHAAAAA…."

"SHUSH!" roars my grandfather from over the newspaper.

Yes, indeed, Onkel is acting strange, even for being… well, Onkel. I would attribute it to the Kaffee except that he hasn't had nearly his normal dose today… is this perhaps what withdrawal looks like?

"Onkel? Are you all right?"

"SHUSH little girl shush! I have important ice cream to anoint the firehose… oh hey my little Boltzmann – constant, equals three point one four one five nine… is a special number see because every time you multiply it the digits add up to… no wait that's pi…"

"Onkel… have you had your medication today?"

"Medicine? I'll give you a taste of your own medicine!"

Onkel's words are not directed at me but to… well, he is shaking his fist and shouting theatrically at… the air, I guess. "You haven't seen the last of me von Keiner!"

"Tahaha _von Keiner… Keiner…_ from nothing… came the universe LET THERE BE LIGHT!"

"Onkel, you're scaring me…"

"Was?"

Onkel sits still and stares into space…

"ONKEL!" I grab his hand and bite it.

"AAAAHHHHH…. Oh, hey, Ludwig, tehehe sorry you have to see me this waaayyy…"

"What way?"

"Unmedicated ladadaaaa…. And you thought I was crazy DRUGGED!"

"Why on earth have you gone off the medication?"

"Why wouldn't I, I HATE the medication, Kaffee or no Kaffee it makes me feel like the undead! Teheheheee I'm actually due to be drugged right about… yesterday YAA YAAAAHHH… but prhrhrr I was BRIBED! See your birdie-faced Mutter over there cut a sucrose little deal with me! I get to go on a nice long drug holiday just so long as I keep my mouth SHUUUUUUT…"

I am struggling to decide exactly how much of this singsong blabber is sane. "I daresay you have already broken that bargain."

"Not yet see if I tell YOU I get le injeccion man͂ana!"

"Tell me what?"

"I'M NOT SAYING YA YA YA YA YAAA YAAAAHH!"

Onkel bounces and rocks around in his seat humming.

"Solvent Kaffee is KAFFEE EATING KAFFEEEEEEEE!"

He shrieks and laughs as he dumps little girl Brauner down his gullet. Brown droplets of Kaffee splash over his lab coat, this being his good one that he kept relatively clean and reserved for special occasions.

"Aahh… Kaffee eating Kaffee… what a world… what a world…"

Onkel belches and requests another beverage, this time a "friar Kapuziner with deep-fried tenure".

"Are you the least bit sleepy tonight, Mein Sohn?"

After today's Kaffee splurge? Not at all. Even though I have been running around all night playing Nazis and Plague victims with Onkel… he is such fun when he's insane!

"Nein, Mutter. Why do you ask?"

"DIE NAZIS DIE!"

Onkel is right behind us, wrapped in a gown of dental floss, holding a laser – and this time a deadly one – aimed at our faces.

"ABER VORSICHT! It's cool man!"

"DROP IT!" Mutter pinches him near the neck to incapacitate him. I am always amazed at how she does that. Onkel drops the laser and becomes docile.

"Ok Wolfgang is little girl now he behave… it's cool man…"

"I should hope so, unless you want to spend your drug holiday in a straitjacket at the Narrenturm!"

"ACH!.. It's cool man… it's cool man…"

"Ludwig, hurry, do you know where he keeps his, err, special formulation of cough syrup?"

"Nein. But he did give me some special cough drops on the way home…"

Come to think of it, no wonder I was knocked out for two days…

"Ludwig, what have I told you about taking anything that Onkel gives you…"

I fish my hands through Onkel's pockets, amidst his jerking limbs and stuttering cries of "It's cool man" until I encounter the bag of delicious, delicious cough drops. Hmm, I don't remember them making me cough… but then I probably slept through that effect.

"M-Mutter, may I have just one…"

"NEIN." Mutter points inside Onkel's throat.

I unwrap the cough drops one boy one, hiding one in my palm as I toss the others into Onkel's mouth.

"How many?"

"All of them."

"Mutter, why don't you just give him a tranquilizer? Is he out of meds or something?"

Mutter sighs, holding tightly onto her Onkel until his cries falter and his appendages stop twitching. "Ludwig, I'm so sorry you have to see him like this… perhaps home is not quite the best place for you while he is in this state. H-how about… you go visit your father for a while… I'm sure he misses you. He hasn't seen you since you were one year old. Don't you think he might want to celebrate your graduation?"

"I doubt he cares about such a thing… wait you want me to go visit him?"

"Mmmhmm."

Well, I suppose that I must visit him… he is, after all, my father, and clearly, for whatever reason, he wants me in his life, and, after a good three years and some months, I daresay I'm about due for another father-son meeting.

"For how long?"

"... Not long."

Mutter answers in a very clipped tone. I am confused. She is acting strange… come to think of it, although her behavior has been largely eclipsed by Onkel's bizarre antics, she has been acting strange ever since graduation. I feel a tiny, discomforting twitch in my digestive organs… or maybe that is just the overload of Kaffee I had today. Or the milk in it… I thought I had cured my lactose intolerance!

"…All right, I'll go visit him… I just hope that Onkel stays asleep until you get back."

…

Mutter's car is already packed, I notice. My violin and my clarinet and my music cassettes and my computer and my chemistry equipment and my tool set and my Swarovski crystal chess set and all of those old-fashioned formal outfits she likes to force me to dress up in and a box of candy – a BIG box of candy.

"Mutter, is all of this really necessary for a SHORT visit?"

"Nonsense. I want you to be as comfortable at your father's as possible. Seeing that your first experience there was, um…"

"Traumatizing."

"Yes… you have not become rusty on your English, have you?" She asks me this in English.

"No, Mother. I have had plenty of practice at the University. I had to write and read and listen to and converse in twenty different languages while there, English being not the least of them."

"Good… now, get in the car…"

"Mutter… you were planning this visit with Father all along, weren't you?"

Mutter sighs. "Yes…"

"And so you really did bribe Onkel with a medication holiday so that he wouldn't tell me…"

"Because I wanted it to be a surprise. I know it sounds a bit extreme, but Onkel is quite the bigmouth, as I'm sure you're aware, and that was really the only way to prevent him from… spoiling the surprise…"

"Oh, I see."

"Now in the car, mein Sohn."

I do as told. But to be perfectly honest, I am not all that sure that I DO see.

The ride to the park where the pipe to the other universe passes in a suffering silence. The silence is only broken when, after Mutter sends the last of my belongings down a pipe, she asks me, in the strangest, almost grave-sounding tone, to give her a hug.

I do not know why, but as she hugs me tightly, I hug her tightly back. As I stand at the edge of the pipe, I take a deep breath out of hesitation and dive in.

The entire experience is not frightening as before, but rather vaguely déjà vu-ish. Spaghettification, emergence into the land of happy face clouds and mountains, and Kamek.

"My broomstick is not going to carry all of this luggage," Kamek grumbles.

"Well, I told Mutter that this all isn't really necessary…"

"Hmmmm…" Kamek hums and seethes as though he is about to say something, but decides instead to keep silent about it. He then ponders the luggage, and pulls out a jeweled scepter from his blue robes and waves it over the luggage.

The luggage disappears in a flash of sparkles and glowing colored triangles and circles.

I am speechless… my… my belongings…

"No reason to fear, my Prince, I simply transported them to the castle."

"Ok, now how about you magically transport us to the castle?"

"Right away. Hop on." Kamek picks up his broomstick, places it between his legs and holds the tail out for me to hop aboard. Not the broomstick again…

"Kamek, why don't you teleport us to the castle like you did with the luggage?"

"Teleporting living beings is not quite as simple as teleporting luggage and such. Don't ask questions, you shall learn later if and when I decide to give you magic lessons."

A strange science, this magic is. But then, I suppose that if it weren't, then it wouldn't be magic, it would be science. And it's obviously not a cure-all for everything, if people still bother with science at all…

And so once again I am whisked away on the broomstick. I must admit, riding through the air is rather pleasant, after one becomes habituated to the initial shock of being suddenly lifted from the ground. I see the varied and strange worlds in passing down below, imagining that I am conqueror of them all.

"So, Kamek, how is King Dad?"

"He's, well, he's got his hands full, that's for sure. The family is quite a bit bigger than it was when you last came to visit…"

Of course. The wives…

"Well, my Prince, I saw your university degree… is that what you have been working on since we last met?"

"Yes. I noticed King Dad wasn't at the graduation ceremony…"

"I assure you, he likely didn't know about it. Unless your mother told him, in which case, er, hehehe… I sure didn't hear anything… so, um, anyway, congratulations, that's quite an accomplishment, especially at your age."

I beam at this praise, and at the memory of graduation, and at the bright future I am most guaranteed of… after my little trip to King Vater's is over, that is.

"Hehehe, yes, indeed. We could sure use the help of a young grad like you around the castle."

And then, we finally make it to the castle. Looks exactly the same as before, inside and out.

"Kamek, where is everyone?"

"Well, uh, the King is, uh…" Kamek clears his throat. "SIRE, YOUR ELDEST SON IS HERE!"

In the time it takes for the sound to reverberate through the castle's halls, transmit through King Father's thick skull and register in his not-so-thick gray matter, I hear – nein, I FEEL the pounding of what could easily be mistaken for an earthquake as he stomps out of his lair and down the first flight of stairs to greet me.

"LUDWIG!" Still pronouncing my name wrong, he seizes me in yet another suffocating hug.

"Oh how I missed you! How was life at your snooty mother's? Did she turn you into a pansy yet? Is it too late for me to make you into a little monster like you were born to be?"

"I… have no intentions of being a monster, King Dad…"

"Well, gosh, we will have to change that! Hey are you ready to meet your brothers and sister? I renovated the castle, and so now they each have their own room, and so do you!"

"…how… nice…"

I gasp for breath after Bowser lets me down, and he leads me to a hallway with rows of doors.

"This first one is for you, Ludwig. Oh, it looks like your stuff is here. Hmm, that way I guess you can decorate it with pictures of pianos and George Washington or whatever it is you fancypants types like. Or maybe swastikas…" He chuckles to himself. I feel rather offended that he would say something like that, but then this is Bowser, it is only to be expected that he would be so narrow-minded as to crack Nazi jokes about his half-Austrian son.

"Ok! Now let's check out Roy's room… you remember Roy, right?"

"Yes, King Dad." I dip my head slightly into my shell.

Roy is now even bigger and beefier than before, though only four, I gather, knowing he is some months younger than I am. I do believe I have nearly caught up with him though, in overall size if not muscle mass.

His room… sloppy bed decorated with pictures from some action cartoon, broken action figures everywhere, a punching bag, some barbells, sports equipment, a toy chest full of weapons… what kind of father gives clubs, maces, and nunchaku to a four year old? Oh and a pet rabbit in a cage in the corner… poor rabbit. And a television with a video game set attached.

Roy points at my hair. "BLUE!" he shouts, laughing. Apparently he learned a new word in the three years since he had seen me.

"Hello, my name is Ludwig. Remember me? I am your older broth-"

"NOOGIE!"

What in Mozart's name is a noogie?

Roy grabs me by the hair and rubs his fist as hard as he can into my scalp.

"ACH! That is painful quit it please! Bitte?"

"All right, that's enough, Bully, leave Kooky's hair alone. Hehe, that's his nickname, Bully, he's my little bully. Come here, son, let your old man give you a noogie..."

Bowser embraces his little bully and does the same fist-rubbing action into his skull, and Roy, oddly enough, seems to be enjoying it. I suppose that is what a noogie is. Who would have ever thought that Roy of all people would teach me a new word?

"Hey, I kinda remember you, Blue. Now I have a lil brother I can play video games with! Kootie don't wanna play cuz she's too girly, and Mort is too stupid to play right, and Larry is too lil to play!"

Well, better video games than the other games he seems to like to play.

I check his video game collection. Street Fighter… Pacman… ooh, Tetris…

"Ok, Kooks, time to meet your sister Kootie Pie – I mean, Wendy." I hear him grumble, "I wanted her to be Kootie Pie…"

Wendy's room is a pink pigsty that reminds me of the harem's quarters that her mother stayed in. Yes, I remember that Emilie had laid an egg she named Wendy, and the three-year-old is indeed the spitting image of Emilie, from the jewelry and high heels and lipstick she is far too young to wear, right down to the polka-dot bow that she is currently grooming while looking into a mirror. The only thing that is missing is Emilie's golden locks… as a matter of fact, the child is bald. Like Roy, born with two alleles for the recessive gene for lifetime baldness in dragon-koopas. So here she is, a sorry sight, taking fastidious care instead over her white-spotted pink bow, a gift from her mother, I presume. She is going to turn it into a rag by brushing it like that…

I look around the room. A curling iron… a blow-dryer… shampoo bottles… why doesn't she get a wig or something?

"Kootie Pie, say hi to your brother."

Wendy drops the mirror and the brush, and her blue eyes light up as she spots me and runs toward me.

"I got a new bwuther? Hi I'm your sister Wendy!"

She gives me a great big kiss on the cheek and then yanks my hair, rather painfully I'll admit. "You has such pwetty hair! Can I bwush it and put wibbons and bows in it?"

"No…"

"But I WANT to! King DADDY, I can do his hair and dwess him up for a tea pawty?"

"Well, actually, sweetie, he has to go meet the rest of his brothers right now…"

"But King DAAAAADDYYY…"

"LATER."

"Why couldn't I have a baby sister instead! WAAAAAAHAhahaaaa…"

"Say bye to your sister Kooky…"

"If you take my bwuther away I'll SCWEAM!"

Bowser shuts the door before she screams.

"Uh, King Dad, you… really need to work more on her manners… and her speech too for that matter…"

"Eh, I blame it on her mother. Now let's meet your brother Morton."

There is loud noise of quite a different nature bursting out of Morton's room. He is a darker than the others, with black and white face paint and no hair except for a couple growing out of a mole on his head. He is banging on drums, the kind that metal bands use, but he has not yet developed a sense of rhythm, being only… two, I should think…

Oh, and he is screaming. LOUD.

"MORTON! WOULD YOU LIKE TO MEET YOUR BROTHER LUDWIG?"

Morton drops the drumsticks and pants to catch his breath. "Hey brother! I didn't know I had another brother! You look like a b-b-b-BIG brother! My name is Morton Koopa Junior, I was named after… my uncle I think, but King Dad likes to call me Bigmouth cause I have SUCH a b-b-b-b-big mouth and I talk a lot, ooh and I eat a lot too my favorite food is cake all kinds of cake I really like vanilla cake and chocolate cake and ice cream cake and cheese cake I LOVE CHEESE! I really like pizza with lots of cheese on it! But Kootie Pie likes mushrooms and Roy likes sausage and pepperoni and I dunno what baby Larry likes King Dad says we're having pizza tonight!"

My… what a mouth for a two year old! "Well, I like anchovies on my pizza…"

"ANCHOVIES?! GROSS!" King Dad roars. "You Europeans are disgusting!"

I really do not understand the bad rap that anchovies seem to have with so many people! "Come now, have you ever even tried them? They're brain food, you know!" Heaven knows he needs it…

"I'M NOT GETTING FUCKING ANCHOVIES ON THE PIZZA! FOR FUCK'S SAKE THAT WOULD RUIN THE PIZZA FOR EVERYBODY ELSE! IF YOU WANT ANCHOVIES ON YOUR FUCKING PIZZA YOU ARE JUST GOING TO HAVE TO ADD YOUR OWN!"

Mein Gott, what a fuss over… anchovies, of all things!

I shift my attention to the interior of Morton's room. There are pictures of heavy metal bands everywhere. Not my kind of music at all. There is also a picture of a dark-skinned Koopa man, dressed in desert garb, signed Morton Koopa Sr. on the wall… well, I guess that is who this Uncle Morton he was named after is… due to the resemblance he bears to Morton in particular as opposed to the rest of the family, I would have figured he were Morton's mother's brother rather than King Dad's brother, but the last name indicates otherwise…

"FUCK! FUCKING FUCK! I like that word, pops, what does it mean?"

Bowser blushed. "Um… it's a bad word, son. Only grownups are allowed to say it…"

"Ok. Sorry King Dad."

"So, uh, it appears that you and Morty have a lot in common, eh? You two both like music…"

"YEAH! I like rock music and heavy metal! My favorite is KISS!"

"Well, my genres of choice are those collectively defined as 'classical'. My favorite artists are Mozart and Beethoven and Haydn and Schubert-"

"Eww, you mean those dead guys! They are b-b-b-b-BORING! Ptooie!"

"Well, uh, ok, son, how about we meet your brother Larry?"

Larry's room is decorated with all of the baby toys and sportsy decorations that Bowser had gotten me at the beginning of my last visit. Kamek is already in there, bottle-feeding the young child.

I creep closer to observe Larry. His hair is a messy blue puff, like mine, but smaller and lighter in color, and his eyes look swollen, his eyelids puffy and purple, wearing a dopey expression on his face with his teeth and tongue sticking out as he suckles from the bottle.

"Lawrence has been very sickly since birth," Kamek murmured to me. "He hasn't spoken his first word yet, and he has barely attempted to crawl, let alone walk."

"How old is he?"

"He, uh… turned two this past April Fool's Day."

Larry looks a fair bit younger than two. I flash streams of knowledge through my mind, trying to think of exactly what sort of illness he might have, and how to fix it…

"Well, uh, we had better leave them alone," Bowser said, closing the door. "Poor kid… I blame it on his mother."

I can just picture Bowser being in the habit of blaming all of his children's less-becoming attributes on their mothers…

"Who is his mother, anyway? Is it Lilly?"

"NO. Dang Lilly hasn't put out for me yet… hasn't laid since those first two, and they were duds… OK, and this last room is spare, empty, this is where any other child that I might have will be kept."

I thought about the eggs that Lilly laid, that, given that Bowser doesn't have any children born to Lilly yet, were still in the incubator, being time-delayed until I decided that they should be born. And quite frankly, I think that the castle has enough to deal with right now without the two of them.

I hear a knock on the door. Kamek's voice asks, "May I assist you in unpacking, my Prince?"

I open the door. "I am most grateful for your assistance. I will have to find somewhere safe to place my belongings lest the children get to them."

"Now, now, Master Ludwig, like it or not, you are a child, just like one of them. The King is not going to confer unto you any special privileges just for being of abnormally high intellect. Though I am afraid that he very much underestimates your giftedness."

Kamek handles my clarinet case. "You play clarinet too?"

"Name any form of classical instrument, and chances are, I not only have played it but am indeed a virtuoso at it." I unpack my frilly Baroque-style outfits and shove them into the dresser drawer that King Dad has so graciously provided, intense friction and all. Maybe, just maybe I will leave them in there when I go home…

"Hmm, I see that your experience at university has not changed your sense of, urm, pride one bit."

"You don't say?"

"Well, usually, one's experience at university, suffering through the toils and such, is just what it takes to set one straight – you know, to, uh, show them that they're not all that they crack themselves up to be, to put them in their place, to teach them who's boss."

"Indeed, it has. My experience there has taught me that I am boss." I gaze rather vainly into the hand mirror that Mutter had packed. I also see Kamek's face in the mirror, sighing, looking as though he feels, um, quite sorry for my sake. What reason would one have to feel sorry for me, a young prodigy with a future brighter than a supernova?

"So, um, how are the wives?" I ask brightly. "May I ask the privilege of meeting them?"

"Well, um, Lilly is at a Drugaholics Anonymous meeting, Amanda is… well I dunno where exactly hehe… and Clawdia is probably cleaning the harem's quarters… the only wife who's any help around here – but really, do you want to, uumm, see her?"

"Um, no thank you…" I recall the envious glare and scowl that Clawdia wore last time I saw her…

"Who is Amanda… and what about Emilie?"

"Well, um, Amanda is actually Emilie's cousin – half cousin, I think – and she's Larry's mother. Emilie introduced her to Bowser, I'm afraid, and as for Emilie, well, she left bowser to live in a Playkoopa mansion."

"A what?"

"Never you mind, you're too young to know, to be quite honest… she tried to take Wendy with her, but the King wouldn't have that, I mean, that would be no place to raise a child!"

"I… see… so who is Morton's mother?"

"Ah, well, uh, funny story about her, hehehe…" Kamek pulled a picture of a plump and curvy dark-skinned koopa lady wearing a garment over her face reminiscent of what real world Islamic women wear.

"The King bought her out of Desert Land to be his wife and personal belly dancer, but they recently separated due to, uh, let's just say a little disagreement… but, um, she still visits…"

"Morton also told me about his uncle that he was named after, though the Junior suffix doesn't make sense…"

"No, Morton was named after his mother. Yes, uh, her name is Morton."

"Oh… but that still doesn't explain why he is Morton JUNIOR… shouldn't he get the junior suffix only if he is named after his father…?"

"Well, um, yes, that's the way it's usually done…"

I entertain a bizarre notion for a few seconds before returning to my unpacking. "Well, King Dad sure has his hands full…"

"Yes. So it would be much appreciated if you would try not to be such a burden to him…"

"Oh, but why would I be a burden? I am far more sentient and well-behaved than his other children."

"Yes indeed, as smart and mature as you are, you will be a great help around here..."

"Oh, but I'm a guest here, and I don't know about Dark Land but in Austria it's rude to have guests help you with anything."

"A g-g-GUEST?!" Kamek whispers to himself, rubbing his hands nervously over his magic scepter.

"Well yes, you didn't think I would actually come to LIVE here in this filthy castle with all of these bratty children and skanky stepmothers, did you?"

"Well, um, that's not up to you whether you live here or not…"

"Kamek?" I rise up from my box that contains my blue quilt and Austrian linen sheets and stare at him. "Exactly how long am I meant to stay here…?"

"Uh-uh-ummmm…" Kamek twiddles his fingers and swallows, his facial pores beginning to excrete sweat. "i-i…indefinitely."

"Nonsense, Mutter said…"

Actually, Mutter said nothing.

"I… I take it your Mutter said nothing about the custody battle?"

"Go on…" I feel somewhat faint…

"Well, um, the King won, of course."

My heart jolts so hard I fear for a second that my life had been taken. "So… that means… "

Kamek nods. "Make yourself comfortable. This is your new home."

I drop to the floor. Blood pounds through my head so hard I can hear it. My arms hang limp from shock. I… I sort of… well I didn't exactly KNOW but I could FEEL that this was happening all along…

"Master Ludwig, are you all right?"

I cannot move a muscle.

"My Prince?"

"Go away."

"Be strong, my Prince…"

"I sad GO AWAY! ICH HASSE DICH!"

I rise and shove him out the door, slamming it behind him.

My Mutter… HOW could she betray me like this?! She kept me in the dark the entire time so that I would go quietly, she even went to the length of bribing Onkel with a DRUG HOLIDAY so that he wouldn't tell me what was going on!

She didn't fight, she didn't shed a single tear… she just handed me over like forgotten luggage to this… this BRUTE…

Why, I'll bet she WANTED to get rid of me! Because I'm too much like Onkel, perhaps? Next she'll go after HIM, have him sent away to a mental hospital only this time PERMANENTLY, and then what, send her parents to a retirement home? Maybe she's dating somebody that she hasn't told me about. Maybe she's got it in for ALL of us… clear out the ghosts of her past and make way for the new…

Hot saline burns out from my lacrimal ducts. I hate her. I hate Bowser. I hate ALL OF THEM!

I feel like smashing, tearing, destroying objects right now! I want to SCREAM myself hoarse!

But I will not. I SHALL not. I shall be civilized, no matter where in the metauniverse I am forced to be. I shall NOT become a victim of my circumstances.

I pick up my violin and play the loudest, angriest song I know. It grates at the ears, the way I am playing it, but I fully intend for that.

I hope that, if any of THEM feel the tiniest little ember of guilt for what they have done to me, that it burns them alive and keeps them awake all night.


	17. Melancholia

I saw away at the violin, hard and fast, with an intensity that would be the envy even of Morton's rock idols. I work myself up into fiddling harder and harder, until I fear that the strings might break from the pressure and frictional heat applied to them. I finish with a raging crescendo and fall silent to the floor, the room shaded by evening darkness.

Kamek knocks timidly at the door. "M-My Prince… it's time for dinner…"

"I'm not… hungry…" I croak, feeble and exhausted. This is a lie, at least according to my stomach, which I now realize is growling.

Apparently satisfied that I don't have the energy to snap his neck, Kamek opens the door and uses his wand to set the torch ablaze.

"You…you look like you could use some sustenance? We're having pizza tonight, you know."

"I know…" I am too tired to seek food.

"Well… you want to eat at the dinner table…?"

"No…"

"Very well then…" Kamek leaves and returns a few minutes later with a plate carrying three pizza slices. Sausage and pepperoni, no anchovies of course.

The meat is bland, the cheese not oily enough, the sauce not saucy enough, the bread too… dry. Or maybe it's because I'm crying, and everything tastes like tears. I eat all of the first slice except the crust, half of the second slice, picking the sauce and the cheese off of the rest, and leave the third slice untouched.

My energy has returned, but I still feel… I don't know. The tears are all gone, and so is the… passion…

My claw robotically rubs the bow across the strings. Slow… sad… melancholic… so this is what melancholy feels like? Indeed… this is what a sad song feels like… I had never seen the beauty in such compositions until now…

I sigh. I should probably sleep, but I know that I cannot... All I can do is tiredly and tirelessly rub out the halfhearted sonata that is trickling out of the void where my heart used to be. I shall title it… _Melancholia_ in D minor…

I will write the notes down somewhere… if I can remember them… if I have the energy…

I play it again… and again… it probably sounds terrible, I am in no mood to be a good judge… and again, until I hear the door creak open.

"Good morning, my prince. Will you be joining us for breakfast?"

Morning already? "I suppose I… shall…"

I dig through my stash for a Milka bar, the perfect size for breakfast, and follow Kamek out to the dining room. I am somewhat unnerved to see all the kids seated there – Larry in a high chair, Morton getting coffee cake crumbs everywhere, Roy wolfing down eggs and bacon, Wendy digging through a box of sugary pink cereal, and a delicate-looking blonde koopa child that I don't recognize eating the same cereal quietly next to her.

"So, young prince, what would you like for breakfast?"

"I already have my breakfast, danke." I peel open the purple Milka wrapper and take a bite.

Kamek places his palm to his face. "Ludwig, that is not ALL you intend to have for breakfast, I hope."

"Certainly not. I desire Kaffee, if you please."

"C-coffee? Aren't you a little… young to be drinking coffee, my prince?"

"Nonsense. Now how do you think I got through Frankenstein University? Now hurry up, I've got a splitting headache here!"

"M-maybe because your young Highness hadn't had any sleep all night?"

"Nonsense! I've slept fewer nights at Frankenstein than I can count off of my fingers and I NEVER had a headache! NEVER! I have gotten accustomed to drinking over 2000 milligrams of caffeine every 24 hours for four months straight and now after stopping all of a sudden OF COURSE I'm going to have a headache!"

Kamek sighs. "As you wish… how would you like it?"

"I want an ice blended Mokka frappe this morning. Five espresso shots. HURRY UP!"

"He-hem?" Kamek grunts, in a tone that indicates that he wants me to say "please".

"An ice blended Mokka frappe with five espresso shots PLEASE!"

"All right, my prince, no need to snap at me… I shall prepare it as requested right away!"

I sit at the table, rubbing my head, melting a piece of Milka in my mouth while awaiting my Kaffee. WHAT THE HELL IS TAKING SO LONG?!

FINALLY he arrives with it. In a large glass container; I am already skeptical…

I take a sip. Too much milk, not enough ice, espresso made from stale beans, and a pathetically stingy amount of chocolate.

"YOU CALL THIS KAFFEE?! FOR SHAME!" I dump the slurry all over Kamek's face.

I come to regret this later, when the caffeine craving escalates to me sneaking into the kitchen to gobble down the rest of the stale coffee beans.

Still not enough caffeine. I eye the jar of instant coffee crystals warily before being driven, out of nothing short of hardcore caffeine addiction, to taste them.

The instant coffee tastes absolutely wretched, worse than stale coffee beans by far! How DARE they spuriously claim on the container for it to be made out of 100 percent pure Arabica filtered coffee! I begin to theorize about what exactly about the process of creating instant coffee, which doesn't (or shouldn't anyway) involve any chemical changes, could change the flavors so that it is utterly unrecognizable as coffee…

I wash the flavor out, unsuccessfully I must admit, with hot tea. Tea generally makes a fair semi-caffeinated coffee substitute, preferable to instant coffee anyway, but the cheap tea from the teabags that had been purchased in bulk, combined with the vile Dark Land tap water that carries a flavor that reminds one of an oversanitized toilet bowl, make for substandard fare that is only slightly ameliorated by the fifteen sugar packets I ripped open and poured into the mug.

For the rest of the day, I decide to isolate myself in the King's pitiful excuse for a library.

Well, actually, it appears to be better-stocked than it was last time. How about that. And not just with children's books either.

I find myself a lengthy tome on the botany of the strange plant species that exist in this universe and I hoist it onto a tacky leather cushion to read it.

I have barely been reading for a minute, having barely passed fifty pages, when who else but Kamek decides to intrude.

"Hmm, it seems that his young Highness is enjoying the new books that I have ordered for the castle library. Do I hear a 'thank you Kamek for talking the King into updating the castle's book collection?'"

I turn my eyes briefly toward the wizened Magikoopa and scowl.

Kamek waves his wand over the coffee stain on his robes, succeeding in fading it only a little bit. "Do I hear an 'I'm sorry Kamek for losing my temper and soiling your robes with the coffee you so generously prepared for me?'"

I roll my eyes. "Do I hear an 'I'm sorry for disrupting your peace my young Princely Genius and I will leave you alone to your studies to further surpass your own brilliance right now?'"

Kamek lifted his wand with one hand and pointed at me with the nagging index finger of the other. "Prince Ludwig von Koopa, that is no way to talk to your elders! I would have thought you were raised better at that fancy Austrian home of yours..."

"Genius trumps age," I scoff. "You could live to be as old as the sun and still never come even close to being as brilliant as I. You are talking to the youngest ever to graduate from Frankenstein University - and that is the most prestigious university in both this and the real world - and whose IQ is likely to be well over twice yours..."

Kamek's face turns red, a vein throbbing near the temple. "You might have the highest IQ of any person that ever existed, but you STILL have the emotional maturity of a three year old!"

"FOUR year old! And I'm turning five in a few short months..."

"I delivered your EGG, your young Majesty, I KNOW how old you are. And knowing that, yes, I MEANT to say three. If even that many..."

I slam my book shut and toss it at Kamek's head. He is knocked over, his hat flying off, his wand clattering to the floor, a bruise welling up in the temple where the vein had been throbbing.

I find this deviously funny somehow. I laugh and laugh, as though I had just invented a better death ray (which I have, on more than one occasion).

"WOO HOO HOO OOoooOOOH!" Wait... I find this, a display of crass physicality, amusing... who am I, Roy? Could I be more like him... and Vater... than I... thought...

No, it cannot be... I shall control myself...

"My apologies, Herr Kamek..." I lift him up, hand him back his wand, place his hat back on his head, rub his bruise. "Thank you for the books, and I apologize for the coffee, and the book too... I shall prepare a formula that shall clean your robes instantly and also an ointment for that bruise..."

"Hmpf. That's more like it..." Kamek croaks as I politely escort him out the door. I shut it and resume my reading.

I spend maybe an hour or so, reading, mulling over many thoughts simultaneously...

My Mutter, a heartless traitor...

My Onkel... a lunatic that should be locked up... perhaps I can cure him? If anybody has the mental profundity required to discover such a cure, it is I... but first I would have to know more about the mechanics and chemistry of such an illness...

My father, a monster...

Kamek, a pompous old nag...

And all those children... UGH! And the wives... maybe I can... no... um...

I reach the end of the book. Having forgotten what the book is about, I flip it over to see the cover, and then I realize... I absorbed nothing the entire time I had been reading the book.

Grrr... ACH! I am supposed to have a photographic memory that can chunk entire pages of fresh knowledge within seconds! Perhaps the dullness of wit is catching...

I had better prepare Kamek that robe cleaner and that bruise ointment...

I return to my room to dig out the required chemistry equipment... and who should be in there but Wendy. Judging by the wrappers on the floor, she had gotten into my Austrian sweets... and my crystal chess pieces!

She is playing with one of the frosted knights, making it 'gallop' over the floor. "Giddyup horsie! My wittle pony, my wittle pony..."

"Wendy?" I restrain my voice, trying to keep my cool, hoping that she will keep hers. "Would you please hand your big brother the horsie?"

"But I like pwetty horsie." Wendy holds the 'horsie' close to her face, kissing it, stroking it, whispering to it.

"Hand big brother Ludwig the horsie, and MAYBE big brother Ludwig will teach you how to play chess later." Ach, that ought to challenge my patience...

"NO! I want to pway tea pawty!"

"Ok, hand your big brother the horsie and he will agree to play tea party." Even though big brother would much rather play chemistry right now...

"Okie dokie." Still holding on to the knight, Wendy grabs my hand, running me to her bedroom.

I put up with an hour or so of having my hair brushed... PAINFULLY... braided.. PAINFULLY... having barrettes clipped and ribbons tied to it... also PAINFULLY... dressed up in several very uncomfortable female outfits that rather chafe at my girth...

"ALL RIGHT I'VE HAD IT WHEN ARE WE GOING TO GET TO THE TEA PARTY?!"

"Sit down Miss Kooky."

I take a seat adjacent to a stuffed pink unicorn and a teddy bear with a rainbow on its stomach. Wendy pours 'tea' out of a plastic teapot into plastic teacups on plastic saucers.

"This isn't tea! This is water!"

"Shh! We make BEWIEVE that it's tea!"

"Well the tea cakes, scones, and or biscuits better not be make believe!"

"They are not." Wendy opens a tray of cookies - Nilla wafers. Nothing impressive.

Still, when one has the munchies...

I seize a few handfuls of cookies and begin to shove them in my mouth but Wendy slaps me.

"NOOOOOOO!" she shouts, drawing out the 'o' for far too long. She fights the cookies away from me and tosses the crumbs back in the dish. "Now we be powite tea wadies and ask 'pwease'..."

"That's it. I've had it. NO MORE TEA PARTIES - or should I say TAP WATER PARTIES!"

I rip the ribbons and barrettes out of my hair, fight out of the frilly white petticoat, and yank the frosted knight piece out of her claws. "MY KNIGHT!"

Wendy begins to shriek at operatic volume, if not sonority, but I slam her door shut before the worst of it can pierce my ear bones.

I return to my room, put the knight piece away and clear away the candy wrappers. My, am I tired today...

No privacy... brats... nags... terrible food and drink... fighting my own raging temper... The thought that tomorrow would be just as bad... if not worse...

And the day after, and the day after...

Forevermore...

A tear drips from my eye. What a waste, that such a genius as I should be relegated to the status of babysitter, and petty tyrant heir to a despotic throne that might not even still be there when I come of age, given my father's incurable ineptitude...

Tonight, as in the night before, I am in very much a _Melancholia_ mood.

My life... in D minor...

...

Day after day passes as such. I have lost count of how long I have been here... has it been a week? Or a month? Mein Gott, it feels like a year...

I can scarcely recount the countless times I have been physically assaulted these countless past days. King Dad literally scorched me quite a few times for trying to sneak key chemical ingredients out of the kitchen, bathroom and laundry room. My cousin Blaze Isabelle, the delicate-looking Koopa girl whom I was not properly introduced to until later, had attacked me for addressing her with the title of "Princess". Even though technically, being my father's niece, she IS a princess... And every time my father had forced me to spend time in the yard outside, I would be assaulted by Roy for practicing my ballet for exercise; apparently such dancing is considered a females-only activity. And nearly every other inhabitant of the castle had bitten, scratched, punched, kicked, burned, or otherwise maimed me over some crime I was not aware I had committed, despite having tried my hardest to be on my best behavior. That is not to say that I had always succeeded...

And so for these long days I have, during every moment that I could, isolated myself either in my room, playing the same tired old melancholic songs on my violin - though not without the occasional burst of inspiration, fueled by recent unpleasant events that were burning in my mind - or reading in the library... or rather, trying to read. The words... the ideas... the pictures just don't sink in like they used to. I feared my mind was going... the premature senility I had feared in my earlier days...

I KNOW my mind is going when Kamek defeats me at chess. Ooh, the RAGE... if Kamek hadn't magically restrained me, using his wand to wrap my blanket noose-tight around my body, I might have wrung his neck dry like a dishrag!

"I went easy on you," I growl.

"Oh, that's QUITE clear, from the temper you flew into, you were clearly satisfied that I had won just as you intended, my Princely GENIUS..."

"Just... let me go and I'll prove you wrong! Rematch! REMATCH!"

"Hmmm... I think I'll leave you like this for a few hours until your cool off a little. Maybe you will think more clearly then, _ja_?"

Whatever. I... I just don't care any more. I shall just fall asleep... yes, I have been sleeping far more often than usual these days... I think I actually slept for five solid hours last night. I might as well stretch for the normal quota of eight or more hours...

I am woken up the next morning by the enticing tinkle of video game music, in the room next door. Roy is playing video games! Perhaps that is just what I need to snap out of this rage... is to own Roy at Tetris!

Woohoohoo... I had always admired the way Tetris intuitively teaches concepts of stereochemistry with the chiral block patterns and such. As a matter of fact, my Groβonkel had designed and programmed a chemical version of Tetris with blocks shaped like actual organic compounds! Maybe it was my younger and thus superior reflexes, but I had ALWAYS outscored my Onkel at it!

Though when I enter Roy's bedroom it appears he is playing Street Fighter. Oh well, I am good at those games too.

"Good morning, my brother. Would you care to, erm, play in two player mode?"

"Kooky! Here, catch!"

Roy tosses the other controller at me; it hits me in the face, having me wonder if my reflexes are fading along with my brainpower. Clearly Roy has been rough on these controllers; the buttons feel soft to press, having been so beaten in that they have to be pressed HARD to function at all.

I am pleased to find that I have not lost my touch. I defeat Roy at the violent game rather easily, he having been slow to catch on to my tactics.

Infuriated, Roy takes the controller away from me and punches me in the jaw. Having learned from being punched without warning by his slow but powerful fists several times, I hold my hands up to guard from greater damage just in time.

Perhaps Roy should not be playing violent video games, if they teach him to behave this way. "Um, Roy, if I may ask, shall we switch to playing Tetris now, if you please?"

"NO! I wanna play Street Fighter!"

I sigh. I go into my room to get my clarinet, and return to Roy's room to watch him play Street Fighter... while playing the Tetris theme tune on the clarinet.

Roy screams. "CUT IT OUT! IMMA TRYIN TO PLAY HERE!"

"Not until you let me play Tetris..." I continue to play the Tetris theme, louder and faster.

"STOOOOOOP!" Roy roars. He throws his controller at the Nintendo system, causing it to shut off, and yanks my clarinet out of my hands and snaps it in two.

I gape in horror as I finger the splintered carnage of ivory and boxwood, horrified at how Roy could break it so easily. My... my clarinet... it was a vintage model, a Christmas present from my grandfather!

ROY WILL PAY FOR THIS!

Snarling, I leap on top of Roy, slamming him to the ground. Before he can punch me, I jump up and stomp his fists down with my feet so he cannot retaliate. I snatch up the front end of the broken clarinet and jab him in the skull with the reed end a few times, as hard as I can muster. Perhaps his skull is too thick; perhaps I should instead jam it down his throat...

Having heard Roy's babyish crying, Kamek bursts in to intervene. "What in blazes are you two doing?"

"K-Kooky's trying to murder me!" Roy screamed.

"Prince Ludwig von Koopa, is that true?"

"Yes. He deserves it for DESTROYING MY CLARINET!"

"STOP!" Kamek does the same trick with Roy's blanket, binding me in it like a mummy. My, does Roy's blanket smell...

"Your father will hear about this..."

And so after I am freed from the blanket, King Dad tosses me in the dungeon. All right, I understand why I must be punished, but what about Roy? Is he to get off completely scot-free after breaking my clarinet?

I linger at the dungeon entrance to eavesdrop on the conversation between King Dad and Kamek.

"He has been completely out of control these past few days!"

"That's it. We have to have him looked at. Schedule the appointment and get ready to take him right now."

"B-but, um, Sire... if I take him, you will have to watch the other children..."

"Grr, you're right. I suppose I might as well take him... heh gives me an excuse to go roving around in my Monster Bowser truck."

'Looked at'... I know what that means... oh well, at least I have the solace of this dungeon, the peaceful vacancy but for a few skeletons and the eggs...

I rush to the lab table where I had placed the incubator. It is dusty, but still functioning, the eggs untouched, still with the names "IGGY" and "LEMMY" scrawled on them. I am surprised Bowser has not found out about them yet...

Another thing I remember... I run, almost giddy to the room where I remember the golden piano had been stored away! Having not touched a piano in a while, I am anxious to get on one, having a few dark new tunes in head that I want to try out on piano...

The... room... is... VACANT. But for a great dust-free clearing in the center of the dusty room where the piano used to be.

He... threw out the PIANO. Just got rid of it, for no reason other than so I couldn't play it. The sadistic brute! He really DOES want to torture me doesn't he!

The last fragment of my heart... shattered... into subatomic particles that are so broken down they cannot be broken down any further...

And indeed, it strikes me... it is not my mind I have lost... but my soul.

The gaping hole where my soul used to be... my mind sinks into it, like a black hole, and, in a feeble struggle not to lose it all, against a half-attempt to just die into the dark relief... I howl. Loud and rich, high and low, from the deepest depths of despair.

**Blaze Isabelle Koopa belongs to Vulaan Kulaas :)**


	18. A Bitter Pill to Swallow

"See that? That's where the loonies are kept," King Dad says as he drives his Monster Bowser Truck (I am not kidding, decorated with spikes and horns and flames to resemble himself) past high concrete and mortar walls with iron spikes and barbed wire at the top.

"Y-you aren't taking me t-there, a-are you?" I question. Although it seems horrifyingly obvious that he is, considering he is pulling into a parking lot adjacent to those walls.

"No. Where I am taking you is to help you out so you DON'T end up in there."

I sigh in relief. I have heard too much about places like those from Onkel. But… what kind of help does he mean?

He takes me into the office of the psychiatric hospital – the outpatient part, as promised. He signs us both in as I roll my bloodshot eyes around in my head trying to concentrate on composing a sonata but being quite unable to due to the lingering adrenaline tensing my veins and amping my heart rate, same as though I were being taken to a dental appointment. I am FINE. I don't want treatment and I don't need it. What I need is to go HOME! And I mean to my REAL home!

I am then taken into a waiting room where I must endure the chatter of degenerate little children. Rather than play with the busy beads or leaf through the children's books or housekeeping magazines (why no medical periodicals?) I indulge my impulsive whims with a gyroscopic doodad on the receptionist's counter, one that has a larger scale model of a pill capsule, complete with the pellets inside, attached to the gimbal, labeled with the name brand Attentox. An ADHD treatment, I figure.

I want a toy like this to call my own, even if it was made to sell medicine that is probably toxic and harmful. How lovely it would be to have such a thing to use as a paperweight in my lab and to keep my hands busy and inspire me should I suffer a creative dry spell! I spin the pill around, watching the motion of the beads and calculating the trajectories of each and every one of them in my head, until King Dad roars at me to leave it alone and sit still somewhere.

"Mister…. von Koopa?" a nurse opens the door to the back to welcome my father and I in for our appointment.

"All right, Ludwig…. LUDWIG!"

King Dad tears me away from the little girl whose lollipop I had been in the process of wrestling from her filthy sticky claws.

"WHAT ARE YOU THINKING, STEALING CANDY FROM OTHER LITTLE KIDS IN PUBLIC!"

"But King Dad… I NEED SUGAR! And for crying out loud she has Down Syndrome! She is barely sentient, let alone able to enjoy the taste of sweets and sugar!"

"Well if you're going to steal candy from toddlers at least get them in a dark alley first!" my father reprimands as I stick the lollipop into the young cretin's hair, laughing at her anguish.

The nurse facepalms as King Dad drags my sulking self by the hair.

"Greetings, my King. I am… well, you can call me Dr. Pill, hehe," says the Medikoopa whose office we are guided into. He has an accent different from that of the denizens native to this area.

Dr. Pill turns his googly eyes toward me. I look down; I tend to refrain from looking upon the gaze of strangers.

"Hello. I am Doctor Pill," he says in a slow, clear, mock-cheerful tone, as though he were talking down to the level of a four year old child, which, as suddenly hits me, is only to be expected because that is, after all, what I am. Of course he isn't going to take me seriously, even should I demonstrate a command of language superior to his own, I should presume.

So why… bother… to waste… my… breath…

"I'm sorry, he's normally quite the chatterbox! He has quite the, um, vocabulary… he even knows how to speak German… Kooky, hello?"

I dejectedly roll my eyes at my father's hand waving in front of my face to assess my consciousness.

"Hmm, he appears sad… what's the word I'm looking for… catatonic?"

_Catatonic!_ I dart my eyes at the doctorate certificate on his back wall, briefly wonder how such an ignoramus managed to score such a degree even for as soft and pseudoscientific a discipline as psychiatry…

Dr. Pill scribbles for a minute on his notepad, muttering and clicking his tongue. "So… is your son hearing any voices? Seeing things?"

"Not that I know of…"

"Has he exhibited any signs of suicidal ideation?

"Suicide?! Well, come to think of it, he has been messing around with hazardous chemicals a lot…"

I must control my mood, repress my behavior. My unbridled temper, after all, is the reason I am in this mess to begin with. Although the urge to at the very least voice my complaints and at the most drive a woodwind instrument fragment through HIS braincase is becoming PAINFULLY tempting…

"So, Mr. Koopa, what is it that brought you here with your son in the first place?"

"Uumm… well, you see, he was moping around a lot, not playing with his siblings, just being a, you know…. What's the politically correct term here?"

"Sociopath," 'Doctor' Pill suggests, writing more notes down. I am rather curious to see exactly WHAT he is writing...

"Right. And then he must have been feeling better, for he was playing video games for a bit and was having a good time… but then he, um, what's the word I'm looking for… SNAPPED."

Pill tut-tutted. "Not good."

"Yes. He jumped on top of his brother and tried to kill him!"

"Are you serious?"

"Yes I'm serious! He was trying to bash his head in with some kind of a… oboe…"

"Clarinet," I hiss in correction.

"Whatever. I've never seen him do such a thing before… well he got I'd say MORE than a LITTLE cranky when his coffee wasn't made to his liking the other day… he had always been, shall I say, not as much of a fighter as I had hoped for him to be. I had wanted him to man up and act like a normal little boy but goddamnit I do NOT want him killing his own brothers!"

"I…see…" Pill mutters absently as he hastily jots down a few more bits of psychobabble.

"Weeelll, Mr. Koopa, judging by what you have said, and what I have seen of your son, I am tentatively diagnosing him with prepubertal manic-depression."

MANIC DEPRESSION! First of all, that is not even proper medical terminology. Secondly, who ever heard of FOUR YEAR OLDS being diagnosed with such a mental illness?! At THAT age it is FAR too early to distinguish dysphoric mania from a mere temper tantrum!

"Knew it. Knew Kooky was a little… kooky. Gets it from his mother's side… you should see his great-uncle…"

It then dawns on me… perhaps this quack does have a point. After all, I am too advanced for my age for mere temper tantrums, I should think… and there is no better explanation for my apparent sudden loss of lightning fast reading ability and other such intellectual talents... and it DOES run in my family… I suddenly know the reason for the look in Mutter's eyes whenever I act, as she puts it, just a LITTLE too much like my Groβonkel…

The seizures, the delusions, the psychoses, the mania, the overall lack of ethics and common sense… all resulting in frequent trips to the psychiatric hospital, a very short tenure for his position as Professor at Frankenstein University, the forced administration of stupefying medications, the being unable to live alone and having to be watched like a child… all of that is GOING TO HAPPEN TO ME.

I am a ticking time bomb. Seeing the high incidence of mental illness all over my Mutter's and possibly also on my Vater's side (wouldn't doubt it one bit), it is only a matter of time before I come down with one form of mental disorder or another. I am, after all, a lot like Onkel was when he was younger, as my grandmother often remarks negatively, and Onkel was very young when he first exhibited the mental illness; since I exhibited my genius at an earlier age than Onkel did, perhaps I shall exhibit the negative symptoms sooner as well…?

I may be so mentally disordered that I am INCAPABLE of comprehending how mentally disordered I am! Maybe I AM seeing and hearing things… maybe I'm not really an almost-five-year-old polymath, prodigy, and university graduate, but a depressed and developmentally delayed twentysomething year old community college dropout living with and freeloading off of my parents…

Pill scribbles on another little piece of paper and hands it, along with a drug info booklet, to my father.

"Have you ever heard of Xombilify?"

"Oh yes! Hehe I remember those cute little commercials… remember Kooky? The one with the cartoon lady wearing the evil blue bathrobe, and the one with the butterflies and the bouncing puffball…"

I shake my head.

"WHAT? HOW DO YOU NOT… oh that's right, he's the kind of weirdo that never watches TV. He thinks it causes cerebrallar entropy or something like that."

"All symptoms of his disorder which should diminish upon treatment with this medication. One week on this medication, perhaps even one day, and I guarantee you will have a calmer, happier, more sociable son."

Hmpf. Maybe I don't WANT to be calmer, happier, or, heaven forbid, more sociable… it's MY BODY. Don't I get a say in what's put in it?

Oh that's right, I don't… I am a CHILD…

Well I want to at LEAST know what the medicine's chemical structure is!

…

Kamek sighs in exasperation. "For heaven's sake, young prince, would it kill you to take just ONE PILL?"

"It might! But the real question is, will I kill myself if I take just one pill?"

I had gotten ahold of the paper included in the bag Father got yesterday at the pharmacy with the pill container and thoroughly read it. It was in layperson's speech – nowhere did it even roughly depict the active ingredient's chemical structure; as for the chemical's given name, well, it was not the proper IUPAC name so I gleaned little about the formula from knowing that. All I know is that it is a "selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor", which I figure means that it increases the concentration of serotonin I have swimming around to hit receptors in my brain. That sounds like a very crude way to treat depression, and one of dubious efficacy at that.

But what really concern me are the side effects. While not as scary as the lists I see on Onkel's medications (which include everything from metabolic disorder to tardive dyskinesia), the list on this one includes SUICIDE. Quite ironic, seeing that it is prescribed to PREVENT that?

"Oh, come now, those side effects are EXTREMELY rare! And if the worst of them is suicide, then so what? You can control yourself… or if not I will! In all likely probability it will do nothing…"

"WRONG! ANYTHING that can get past the blood-brain barrier, and in sufficient concentrations, is bound to have some sort of effect on the mechanisms of the brain! And being how quantitatively AND qualitatively different MY brain is from most, the side effects profile could be VASTLY different and more dangerous…"

"Well, in that case, you should relish the opportunity to, ahem, experiment, ehehe…"

"As much as I love to experiment, I would rather not test it on my own brain, I mean, why mess with such a great thing..."

"Please, your young Highness, just half a pill then? You do want to get better, don't you?"

"Actually, yes… Well I mean I would appreciate not being miserable for once in this filthy overheated underfurnished battle fort…"

"And y-you know, if you refuse…" Kamek gulped. "They have other methods of… administration."

As I know all too well from watching the folks that come in to treat my kicking and screaming Onkel on a biweekly basis…

Now really... in any case... what have I got to lose?

"All right. I will prescribe to a daily pill half. But you MUST promise me…"

"I already swear, my Prince, should you report even the slightest little troublesome side effect, I will tell the King and have him take you off and then we shall find you a new treatment."

"Hopefully NOT a pill-based treatment…"

"Ehehe we'll see…"

I swallow half of the split Xombilify pill. I should have asked Kamek to prepare me a Kaffee first; the pill is dry and the coating burns the esophagus somewhat coming down…

…

"Good morning, young Prince." Kamek greets me in the morning after I wake up from a full nine hours of slumber. After a mellow afternoon of television, video games and slight dopiness, I had fallen asleep rather early.

"Good morning."

"So, how do you feel? Any worsening depression or thoughts of suicidal ideation?"

"No…"

"Migraines? Nausea? Vomiting?"

"No…"

"Mania? Delusions? Hallucinations?"

"No…"

"Sexual side… whoopsie, hehehe you're too young to experience any of those…"

"Well, actually, now that you mention it, I can no longer feel… um, never mind." I blush a tad.

"S-so, you think you'll be safe to take the full dose this morning?"

"…yeah…"

I swallow the entire Xombilify pill with a sip of Mokka. It tastes more like chocolate milk with a tiny bit of Kaffee flavor than Mokka, but I don't really mind…

...

"Go out and play with your siblings," King Father roars after breakfast.

I go outside to play with my siblings. I know that Roy is going to torment me verbally and physically, but somehow the thought doesn't bother me today. I'll take it as it comes.

As I go outdoors, everything is so... bright... TOO bright, so painfully bright... but the kind of pain that doesn't... hurt... also soft and... beautiful I guess?

But the brightness is making me sick. I feel like... well not quite like but... puking, almost...

But I am fine. I sit down and tell myself, this will all come to pass. You will be fine.

Fine.

Fine...

"Hello? Blue? Are you feeling all right?"

Roy thunks my forehead with a flick of his thumb and index finger. I rub my head. It hurts, but not in a terribly bad way.

"I am fine, danke for asking."

"You seem weird."

I stare up into his sunglass-shaded face, his mouth betraying a quizzical expression.

"Would you like to learn to waltz?"

"Waltz?"

"It's a dance that a man does with a woman, so not for 'sissies', as you would call it. You, I'm afraid, will have to be the girl though, since I will be the one that leads..."

"Me the girl? No way!" Roy thunks me again.

"Hahahaha..."

I decide that the most sensible thing to do is leave this dirt pit. Escape over the spike-tipped, five yard high wall while Roy is busy taunting Morton for engaging in Wendy's 'girly' activities of hopscotch and jump rope. I accomplish this quite easily by tying the empty bucket of sidewalk chalk onto the jumping rope, tossing it up the wall like a grappling hook to grab onto one of the spikes, and climbing up and down using the rope. Simple for a Frankenstein University graduate.

The sun seems to shine brightly through the stratosphere of volcanic smog. The twisted weeds growing out of the barren soil seem so... lush...

I walk along, almost gleefully, until I come to what appears to be a convenience store, called Shellz.

Shellz. Hmm. Owned by a distant relative on Mutter's side perhaps?

Next thing that grabs my attention... the sign in front advertising "espresso drinks".

KAFFEE!

I rush my happy self in, hoping their Kaffee is better than what Kamek had served me that first morning...

"I would like a large Mokka with an extra shot of espresso... um, wait..."

I forgot... these places require money. The only money I have are a few Austrian Schillings in a coin purse Mutter gave me that I am hiding in my shell. I take a five Schilling piece out, hoping that the simple creature at the cash register would accept it out of curiosity and lust for shiny objects without regard to legal tendar status.

"Do you accept these as payment?"

The creature eyes the cupronickel coin with the curiosity and lust I had hoped he would, and happily takes it before grinding out some espresso to add to steamed milk and chocolate syrup.

Despite the near-scalding temperature, I suck the Mokka down in a matter of minutes. The espresso itself is not as good as that I had back home - it tastes rather burnt, and not as subtle - but still better than any I have had in this world so far, and the generous amount of chocolate in the drink, making it far sweeter than Mutter or maybe even Onkel would have it, ameliorates the bitterness and sates my raging sweet tooth.

Somehow, despite how fast I had ingested the drink, I do not feel the buzz of adenosine antagonism. Strange. Have I really become so caffeine tolerant? I request another Mokka, this time a frappe with TWO extra shots of espresso.

I drink this one even faster, even licking the whipped cream out of the cup, and I STILL do not feel the buzz. Although I quite badly need to use the restroom now...

Hmm, I shouldn't wonder...

"Sir, if I find you have been pulling the decaffeinated wool over my eyes, I..." An empty threat. I should be enraged to the point of threatening to wring his throat right now! And yet I'm not...

"No, it's not decaf." The espresso jockey sighs in exasperation at my suspicion. "Do you want another one?"

"Yes, please."

And so I buy drink... after drink... after fully caffeinated yet ineffective drink... and run to the bathroom a few times... until I find I am all out of Schillings.

I should be concerned. I should be VERY concerned. But I don't feel like being concerned right now. I leave Shellz and walk home.

...

"Good afternoon, Prince Ludwig and Princess Wendy. May I join in afternoon tea?"

"Yes you can! Here, you can have Koopie doll's seat." Wendy lifts and tosses the infantile mannequin out of the chair on her right so Kamek can sit next to us. I suspect that he is welcome to the party because of the tray of fresh-baked chocolate grub cookies he is carrying.

"So, Master Ludwig, or shall I say, Madam Ludovika..." Kamek sniggers to see that I am dressed in a bonnet and a glitter-stained petticoat, with red lipstick smeared up to the borders of my nose and chin, and pleated hair in pink ribbons with Barbie doll brushes caught in the tangles. I simply smile while savoring the pairing of crisp savory mealworms with semisweet melted chocolate chips.

"Well, Ludwig, I can definitely see a change in you. It is nice to see you so CALM, playing so nicely with your sister for once. I am gladdened to see that you are happy now."

I nod. Yes, I am happy! I must be, for I haven't had a tantrum in a week!

This feeling... is this how normal people that aren't manic-depressive feel when they are happy? I mean, it isn't quite how I felt when I was happy before, but then perhaps I had never truly been happy before...

Kamek visits me again later while I am in my room watching an old horror movie on TV. I happen to have a soft spot for horror movies - not because they are horrifying; no, such things do not scare me at all. I instead find them horrificly HILARIOUS.

It is not often, however, that I have the patience to sit through three hours' worth.

"Good evening, Ludwig. Are you still feeling all right?"

"Yes."

"Good, then." Kamek looks down before stepping upon my violin bow that I had left on the floor instead of putting inside the violin case; as for the violin, that is right next to my bed, unmade covers strewn over it, while the violin case is on beneath pile of books that I had absorbed with my usual frightening clarity and speed over the past couple of days but had never gotten around to sorting away.

"I say, I haven't heard you practice your music in a while. I rather miss your all night violin sonatas."

"Really."

"Yes, really. It's rather nice to have such a talent to listen to when the King is forcing me to work night shift."

Kamek sounds... sincere.

"Well, I haven't felt like practicing my music in a while..."

"Written any new songs?"

I recall one that had seeded in my mind about a week ago, but I have not yet felt the drive to finish it.

"...no."

"Hmm, well too bad..."

Kamek continues to stand here in my room. Meanwhile, I continue to whisper to myself...

"You said something, my Prince?"

"What? Nothing..."

I stare down, away from the television and into the threads of the uncased pillow I am sitting on.

"_Ich hasse mich... ich hasse mich... ich hasse mich_..."

What am I saying? I bite my tongue, just hard enough not to savor blood.

Kamek stares at me. I can feel it. Not because of the overhigh serotonin levels, but in spite of them...

He KNOWS... he knows, without even asking it, that I do as a matter of fact have something I would like to tell him...

"Kamek... the truth is... right about now especially... I really do not know how I am feeling..."

"What do you mean, you do not know?"

"It feels like... it feels like I am calm, happy, but for a little questioning twinge... I think... I think it's tears that are not being allowed to fall out? But what for? What reason do I have to be unhappy? I am happy! HAPPY! I am full of smiles and giggles!"

"Hmm, well, this is just my view, but it seems to me that you have lost the will to cry... that you do not want to cry any more, even when you want to... hehe, that's quite the paradoxical situation you've got there, no wonder you're confused..."

"Yes. I am very confused. But I don't really mind strongly enough to seek an answer as to whether I'm happy or not. Quite frankly, I do not care whether I am happy or not."

Kamek draws a sharp breath, almost a gasp. "Well, my Prince, not that you care, as you have just stated, but should you ever again question how you are feeling, I would suggest that you follow the existential premise that happiness is as happiness does, and ask yourself: Am I behaving like a happy person?"

"I do not know, how is a happy person supposed to behave?"

"You tell me, Mister Highest-IQ-in-the-Universe. This past week, you have not been yourself. You have not kept a good standard of hygiene... okay, so you have never had good hygiene, but it would seem to me that lately your hygiene has gotten even worse. You haven't touched your instruments. You haven't been hyper after drinking a gallon of coffee... okay, maybe that's not a bad thing... you have watched more television in a week than I would have expected you to willingly watch in a year... you have tolerated frightful levels of abuse by your siblings, without doing anything in your self-defense... look, your room is a mess! Yes, I know, what's new, but you used to be obsessive-compulsive about keeping your possessions neat and in order... and look at it now! Oh and it looks like Wendy took one of your knights again..."

I smile and giggle weakly. "She actually took the frosted king and the black queen, and is using the former as a salt shaker and the latter as a pepper shaker. My, how creative little children can be!"

"And you don't CARE?!"

Kamek's tone has been rising to near-accusatory levels throughout the course of this diatribe. My, is he of perpetual motion when it comes to expelling hot air!

"WHERE IS THE LUDWIG I USED TO KNOW? WHERE IS THE FIRE, THE SPIRIT, THE DRIVE? YOU HAVE DEGRADED TO THE STATE OF A SLOTH WALLOWING IN SHALLOWS OF EMPTY CONTENTMENT! YOU HAVE LOST ALL WILL TO DO ANYTHING... CONSTRUCTIVE! YOU HAVE LOST A GOOD DEAL OF YOUR SENSE OF SELF-PRESERVATION... AND WHAT IS WORST OF ALL IS THAT IT DOES NOT BOTHER YOU ONE BIT THAT YOU HAVE BECOME SO APATHETIC! DOES THAT SOUND LIKE A HAPPY PERSON TO YOU?!"

Kamek... has a point. No, that does NOT sound like a happy person. That sounds like... textbook depression.

Glossed over with a dusting of serotonin, to give you a feeling of artificial contentment, and smiles... painted on the inside, so YOU are tricked into thinking you're happy. One might liken it to treating the symptoms of depression without addressing the cause... I suddenly understand Onkel's joke with the cough syrup on a sickening new level.

Only I wasn't THIS depressed to begin with!

But WHY is Kamek blaming me?

"Kamek... please quit yelling at me. It's not my fault... it is the medicine that is making me act and feel this way."

"Oh, sure, blame it on the medicine..."

"YOU made me take the medicine!"

"What was I supposed to do, considering how out of control you were? You would have probably murdered half the inhabitants of this castle over this past week had I not talked you into taking it, but I suppose that wouldn't be your fault either..."

"So I threw a few temper tantrums, big deal! I don't need the medicine, it's nothing I can't handle on my own! There is NOTHING wrong with me! I, and I alone, am in control of MYSELF!"

"Oh, is that so, hmm?"

I know that tone. It is the "See, I was right all along!" tone; the very same tone I have heard from my own Mutter on more occasions than I care to admit.

"Yes, Kamek. Now I would like to stop taking the medicine so that I can go back to being my cranky old self."

"Very well, then. Perhaps I should hold onto these just in case..."

"Yes. Put King Dad on that zombie drip! Or Roy..."

Kamek smirked and winked. "We'll see."

Over the next couple of days, I can feel the zombie serum clear from my plasma, and instead of the dreaded discontinuation effects I read about, I feel rejuvenated, the joyful giggles once again bursting out in spasms instead of in feeble bubbles, and the caffeine highs return, as strong as they have ever been. The irritability is also back, but to a reasonable degree. I can handle the minor trials of living in this hellish fortress; I will simply have to take charge of how I view it - as a challenge akin to university study, only more perilous... an adventure perhaps? And change what I can about it to suit my needs and desires, and adapt to that which cannot be changed - and I doubt there is much to bemoan here that I cannot change, for yes, I am still a genius, even more so every day.

Xombilify... they might have so slyly placed an 'X' at the beginning to obscure the spelling, but that does nothing to change the apt pronunciation.

But I cannot say that it did not have a single beneficial effect... for it had taught me a number of hard lessons.

The most important one to wit being...

If one does not take charge of his own life, there are many that would be all too willing to take charge of it for him.


	19. Magic

"Good morning my Prince... eehh, were you up all night again?"

Curse Kamek for pulling me out of my trance, lost in the land of 137-dimensional hyperspace. "It's morning?"

Kamek seldom finds me in bed when he opens the door to 'wake me up' in the mornings. As a matter of fact, he often does not find me in my bedroom at all - more often than not I am up all night in the laboratory I have recently refurnished in the dungeon.

"Well, in any case, I can tell that getting up in the morning will never be an issue for you. That will work to your benefit, no doubt."

"Mmhmm." My eyes are still glazed over the miniature chalkboard I had been writing and rubbing on all night, my mind on its way back to the world of vector spaces.

"I say, what exactly has tonight's adventure been?" Kamek adjusts his glasses as he peers over my sloppy chalk writing.

"I was trying to set a metauniversal record for proving the largest number of unproven math conjectures in one night."

"Oh? Well, I daresay that proving even one in one night would set a record. Just how far have you gotten?"

"I've proven two so far tonight, I just invented one that I am trying to prove right now..."

"Good luck with that. Too bad that won't leave you any time to begin your magic lessons today..."

I drop the board. Kamek is volunteering to teach me magic?

"You don't say? I suppose two in one day is a fair enough record. I have rather bored of the study of complex functional analysis anyway. Not quite challenging enough."

Kamek giggles weakly at this statement. "So, what will you have for breakfast?"

"I have had quite my fill of Kaffee and chocolates just a while earlier, Master Kamek, thank you for asking."

"Quite eager, aren't we? Well, we shall have your lessons in the dungeon, so as not to disturb your father, who as a matter of fact has fallen quite ill these past several days."

I have in fact not noticed that my father had scarcely been up and about in recent days, nor have I much grieved for his presence.

Kamek, as always, fires orange blazes out of his scepter to light the torches in the basement. Today, however, I observe this action with eyeballs wide with more curiosity than ever before. What exactly does it take to do that? Is it as simple as waving the wand? Does it require concentration? A certain mental ability? A certain spiritual gift?

Whatever it takes, I am most certain I will excel at it. After all, I have excelled at everything I have tried so far.

"Now, now, my Prince, I feel much obliged to inform you right now that the study of magic will be most unlike the study of anything else you have ever studied before. It defies science, and yet it is rather a science itself. It is an art, but with an element of danger absent from all other arts that hinders its potential for imaginative expression. It is very dependent upon the emotions and the state of mind of the magician, but the mood that would inspire a rapturous symphony or a magnificent painting will more certainly than not result in the magician's self-destruction. Most importantly, studying will only take you so far, for magic is ninety nine point nine percent PRACTICE."

I listen intently, hoping that Kamek does not receive the impression that I am allowing his speech to go in one ear and out the other as he pauses to clear his throat.

"Magic is a talent that is quite separate from intellectual faculty," Kamek went on. "Those that are extraordinarily talented at either magic or intellect tend to be mediocre or even deficient at the other."

"Kamek, I have a question."

"Yes, my Prince?"

"If that is so, then which of the two do you happen to be deficient in, may I ask?"

Kamek blushes. "MOVING ON... we shall begin with a few simple spells. Spells are easiest to cast, especially to the inexperienced or untalented magician, with a scepter such as this one. I made this one myself a couple of centuries ago."

I stare deep into the blue stone it is studded with - a blue topaz, if my knowledge of mineralogy serves, cut and polished en cabochon.

"The stone that serves as the stud of the scepter is very important. Best results are achieved when the stone is the user's birthstone. A peridot or onyx would work best for you, but since this is the only scepter I have, topaz will have to do."

I raise a claw hesitantly over the stone, lifting my pleading gaze to meet Kamek's.

"Go on, touch it."

I first stroke it with one finger. The rest of the fingers follow, until I have my claws tightly clutched around the stone, the face snugly cupped into the palm.

"Now tell me, Ludwig... what is the nature of the energy you feel from it?"

I close my eyes. The stone does not feel as warm as one would expect given it had been ablaze a minute ago, but I can feel a different sort of heat emanating from it, like more of an intrinsic power that does not flow out of it, although my hand, and indeed my entire body, is taking on its nature... or am I imagining it?

"It feels like... clarity. A fiery sort of clarity..."

Kamek withdraws the scepter from my grasp, and I can feel the sense of blazing bright clarity disappear, as in vanish into nowhere rather than dissipate into the environment like normal heat energy would.

"Hehem... good. That is exactly what it is supposed to feel like."

"Now we shall start with something simple, my Prince, like, say, a fireball?"

I nod and reach for the scepter, but Kamek holds it back.

"Listen. I am only just now teaching you magic because I feel that as of right now, you are ready to handle it. I might have taught you sooner but you were not emotionally equipped to handle it. I am trusting you now to have the sense of responsibility to follow my instructions without question, until you have mastered the art, as I will inform you of such when the time comes. Can I trust that my faith is well-vested in you, that you will not prove me wrong?"

Kamek is clearly dead serious about this. I see no reason for him to not disclose whatever he is withholding from me, and I am generally suspicious of authority figures behaving this way, but I sense no ill intentions from him, so if only for his sake, I shall play his game.

"Yes, Kamek."

Kamek hands me the scepter and takes a step back.

"Now, the first time will take the longest, I want you to first get a feel for the energy of the scepter, and also a feel for the state your body is in while holding the scepter."

Indeed, I do feel a change. I might almost liken it to the change I felt while on Xombilify, except this feeling is almost the exact opposite of how Xombilify made me feel. Why, I can feel the rising crest of a tidal wave of euphoria...

"You will feel start of a rush, an exhilirating, intoxicating rush of power on the rise. Do NOT let it rise. For if it rises, it will crash, and you will burn. You must control your breath, hold steady. Do not allow it to sink back down away, but do not let it rise all the way. Keep it at just the right level, you will know and feel when it is at the right level... there, there, you're doing fine..."

I breathe deep, but not too deep, at a steady, rhythmic pace. The scepter, I notice, is glowing, and Kamek appears alarmed at this.

"Uuuhhh, that glowing, you need to stop that, just lower the rush a little... there, now, you shall not fire any flames until you feel in complete control of the power that rushes in you."

I am in control. I am rushing with power but I am in control. I await Kamek's acknowledgement of such...

"Now let it rise just a little... just enough to make it glow..."

I try to suppress the twinge of excitement that the sight of the steadily intensifying blue glow elicits from my body. I must keep calm, no jerking between excitement and panic. I await Kamek to give me the word...

"Now, FIRE."

Almost instinctively, I know just how to wave the wand to make the fireball come out. It is not orange like Kamek's but blue, hotter, and, as I realize without even thinking, still under my control.

Eyes and mind transfixed on the fireball, I move my wand to trace it, albeit slowly and unsteadily, in a jagged figure eight above our heads. Kamek watches, his expression unreadable behind the blue glare over his glasses.

And then, without warning, the fireball drops and lands on his head.

"Oops!" I giggle, having not intended for this to happen at all... or have I?

Kamek snatches the scepter from my claws and swiftly removes the blaze, along with all traces of burning. I am still giggling, even more so now that I am not in danger of setting myself ablaze from it.

YES. I am a natural at magic, just as I am at very near everything else.

"So, Kamek, do I ace magic? Am I talented or what?"

"Well..." Kamek does not want to admit it. He does not want to reinforce my ego. He was hoping, desperately, that I would fail at magic, that his little lesson would humble me.

Or... am I indeed deficient in some way that I am not aware of? No, no, impossible...

"As far as holding the wand and controlling the power level goes... well, for all I can tell, you will be, ahem, quite a hit with the ladies one of these days, hehehe..."

Well, that was a non sequitur, if ever I heard one.

"I say you have had QUITE ENOUGH magic for today, young man. Why don't you just return to your... errrr, math proofs..."

"As I stated earlier, I had bored of that. But that magic lesson has me inspired... I wish to play some music now. As a matter of fact, I just came up with a piece that I believe would sound simply magnificent on a PIPE ORGAN."

My birthday is coming up. I hope Kamek gets the hint.

"W-well, your violin will have to do for now-"

Our conversation is broken by my father's roaring, from a few floors above.

"Goodness gracious, it's time to medicate the King!" Kamek scurries up the stairs to the entrance of the dungeon.

"Say, Kamek, what exactly ails Father anyway?"

"Eeeerrr, hehe, your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps even better..."

And so Kamek fully exits, my mind left in a puzzling cryptic note.

Perhaps I should check up on the King to see what exactly is ailing him.

Which reminds me... I need to check up on Larry too. See if I can cure his sickliness.

Yes, I should push my art aside for now and get to work...

All of a sudden I am startled by the distant sound of a frantic pacing inside this dungeon. Who? Who is in here? And why? My pulse suffers a momentary accelerative jolt from this...

Maybe I am just hearing things. Onkel, after all, often complained that he heard sounds that no one else was hearing, and that I was bothering him when I wasn't...

Nein. That would be to assume that I am as mentally ill as my Onkel. I am not, I repeat, NOT suffering from any such derangement. Yet. But not now, certainly not now, and certainly, I hope, never.

The pacing becomes louder as whoever it is gets closer and closer. And it slows down, softens...

I turn around. Nothing there.

Whoever it is has ninja-like stealth prowess. I wonder frantically who it is... one of Bowser's henchmen? And why is this creature running around like it is... scared?

I step closer to the staircase. Certainly, if it is indeed a prisoner, then it would be in a hurry to exit the dungeon - when I am not around to spot them, of course.

I climb to the top of the staircase and hide inside my shell, with the full intention to pop out and catch whoever it is when it tries to make its way out.

I hear it, coming up... not only do I hear it, but when it gets closer I also can feel its presence, almost feel the creature breathe...

And then the feeling of presence disappears. I reach an arm out, feeling around, feeling nothing...

"Boo."


	20. Napalm

Startled, I turn over too fast and my body tumbles right off the top of the staircase. I land shell-first on the dungeon floor, the spike on my shell driven into the mortar like a nail hammered into wood.

The intruder lands smoothly feet-first before me, having leaped down from the top, and I see that the intruder is a female of the same species as I, and around the same age as my father. Her body appears lean and healthy, with a good balance of sinew and curve, the shell is a blue of a hue paler than Mutter's, and she is clothed in scanty black lingerie and black-and-white striped gartered stockings, and carrying a heavy-looking bag over her shoulder. Her face is perforated with multiple piercings and tattooed with the shape of a blue star on one cheek, and her hair is wild, spiky, and colored in glowing pink and blue. The overall impression is that of the type of person that Mutter would consider a bad influence, even dangerous, and would not want around me... and, as a voice in the back of my mind quips, exactly the type of woman that the King would add to his harem.

"Well, well, well, if his Royal Crown Princeliness hasn't crawled out of hiding," she says in almost a mocking tone. "I don't believe we've been introduced yet?"

"You are Queen Consort Amanda, mother of my youngest brother Lawrence, if I am not mistaken?"

The woman laughs. "You really are as sharp as they claim aren't you?" She heaves the bag over her shoulder and sets it down. "I am the one, the only..." She leaps upon the bag. "Amanda Napalm!"

I wince as she strikes a showy pose on top of the bag. She bends over and asks in a half-whisper, "Do you know why they call me Napalm?"

"You... in some way bear a resemblance to a form of jellified gasoline that has been used as a war weapon?"

Amanda laughs the loudest, most raucous laugh I have ever heard. "Never mind hun, you're too young to know."

She jumps up and lands her rear on the bag to sit on it. I hear the clanging of the bag's contents, and out of the end I see a few coins and jewels spill out.

"Pardon my asking, madam, but would that bag of treasure by any chance happen to be from the King's treasury?"

Amanda pauses and stares for a moment, her face betraying a hint of deathly horror.

"...Yes, yes it's from your father's treasury. I have some... let's just say some major fines to pay off."

"Ah, I see. Did you ask King Father's permission to raid the treasury to pay your fines off?"

"Did you ask King Father's permission to set up your own personal lab in this here dungeon and experiment on two of your unhatched siblings?"

Touche. "You... know about that?"

Amanda laughs and tosses herself on her side, flexing her legs into the air. She clears her throat, and I, curious, sit down myself to listen to what is sure to be an interesting and innuendo-laced story.

"Okay, where to start... I met your father through my cousin. Have you ever met Emilie?"

"Wendy's mother? Yes I... have... but she's living elsewhere now?"

"Yeah, at the Playkoopa mansion. Was a resident there for half a decade... damn, that place was the ritz, and I was the STAR. Got a pinup in every Playkoopa magazine. Put on one hell of a show every Friday and Saturday night, and then a little after show after hours, if you catch my drift."

"Exactly what kind of a show? A concert? A play? An opera?"

Amanda laughs that loud, raucous laugh again, kicking her feet back and forth, slapping her belly, carrying on for nearly two full minutes.

"AHAha... that's rich hun... I could show you some tapes but they're rated X so... you get the picture... anyway now Emilie is the star of the show. Living her dream you might say. I gave it all up just like THAT so she could have some of the limelight she craves so desperately..."

"Really, now? That is quite... altruistic of you..."

"I'm afraid not hun, my days there were numbered anyway. When I mentioned those fines I wasn't bullshitting you."

"Fines for... what, if I may ask?"

"I've been making payments for the past, eeerrr, I'd like to say three years... Had to work after hours to make enough. You'd think the pimp in charge of Playkoopa would provide better health insurance..."

"Oh, so by fines you mean... medical bills."

Amanda laughs sarcastically and sighs. "Yeah, let's just say my lifestyle comes with its own set of risks.

"So yeah I worked the graveyard shift as a call girl. Heavy on the BDSM, that was my thing, for a reason too."

"Heavy on the what?"

"BONDAGE. I got hired by guys that like to be bound and gagged." She snickered. "Very cheap for the asking price, but ohhh, they paid for it in other ways. See, when they trust you to tie them up inside their own house like a freaking kidnapper, you can pretty much get away with anything. Sooo... they got their pleasure, and I took off with their treasure. Simply brilliant, wouldn't you agree?"

"Hmm... I do not know why anybody would get pleasure out of being tied up, especially since that leaves you free to take off like a bandit with their valuables, but given that they do, the concept seems quite elementary."

"Says the genius" Amanda chuckles. "Anyway I became quite infamous for that. Although nobody knew what they were getting when they hired me so... I managed to swipe enough not to die for a while. I survived a beastly case of Koopa pox, the Birdo flu pandemic of two years ago - caught it TWICE - a foodborne bacterial infection, some kind of cancer... oh and I almost died of a cold last winter. A COMMON COLD! And right now I am suffering from a very rare form of hepatitis..."

"You... get sick an awful lot."

"Mmhmm. And I never used to get sick at all."

"But wait... now you're doing that to my father. You married him so that you could tie him up and take his treasure every night to pay for your own sickliness!"

"HAH! And he LOVES IT! Buuut... odds are you won't have to worry about that much longer..."

Amanda's laughter changes to a sheepish tone. "I'm afraid my time is just about up. There isn't much they can anymore for me... your father, I give him about two years, if he survives what he's got now. As for little Larry, heh, his days were numbered from the start..."

I am not sure what to feel towards this woman - scorn for her selfish deeds, or pity for her suffering a never-ending stream of terminal maladies. She turns an eye toward the table with my science equipment.

"Unless..." She turns her eyes toward me, and suddenly falls onto me, clutching me by the shoulders.

"You... YOU can find the cure, can't you?"

Quivering with unease at the feel of her claws digging through my scales, her pleading face close to mine, I can now see the yellowing of jaundice in her eyeballs.

"P-possibly..."

"Forget me. My life, my wretched, worthless life... if I ever did one good motherly deed for my son it would be to implore you to FIND A CURE... and your father... oh wait why would you save him? He dies, YOU get to be King."

She laughs at that last remark and releases me from her clinging desperate grip to stand up and once more toss the loot bag over her shoulder.

"Wait, why bother stealing to pay for medical treatments if your days are almost up?"

Amanda cackles as she races up the staircase. "All right, I admit I was totally bullshitting you when I said I was going to use THIS bag of treasure to pay for that!"


	21. Medicine

Well, that did it. I now have a very well educated guess as to the nature of the illness that is ailing Larry.

And the King, for that matter. Indeed, if I am correct, their afflictions are one and the same, and linked to the immoral habits of the strumpet that mothered Larry, who clearly suffers from it as well.

The fact that nobody else in the castle is affected is telling, very telling.

The disease that I suspect is incurable within the scope of current medical practice. What a thrill it would be, then, to be the first to cure it!

I leave the dungeon immediately to attend to Larry. Kamek is already there, wrapping the shivering infant in a blanket.

"KAMEK! Ahem... Larry..."

"Is deathly ill," said Kamek morosely, watching Larry feebly push himself up from under the blanket to crawl, his arms trembling with the chills, only to collapse with a congested sigh.

"I fear he will not live to see tomorrow..."

"Just as I had thought. I need to borrow him..."

"Ludwig..."

"What have we to lose?" I swaddle the blanket tightly over Larry and pick him up. "I believe that I know EXACTLY what is wrong with Larry... and the King..."

"Ludwig, you do not know everything..."

"I'm not one hundred percent certain. But I do know for sure just how to find out."

I run with Larry back to the lab. I will need to take a blood sample and view it under a microscope, and it will have to be my scanning electron microscope, since a light microscope does not have the required resolution. I am rather proud of what I had managed to build out of microwave, radio and television parts.

Larry does not even attempt to resist as I puncture the third digit on his left forearm to squeeze a droplet of blood out onto a slide, and then wrap it up tightly with gauze, knowing that his suspected condition may render him a relatively easy bleeder. I spray the slide with vaporized gold, place it under the electron gun, salvaged from the big TV in the living room after it 'accidentally' gave out, and view the image that appears on the little TV screen from the small black-and-white set the King had forgotten he even owned, that he kept next to the blender in the kitchen.

I see mostly red blood cells, which appear to be normal. The platelet count is low, as I had suspected. Also scarce are leukocytes - white blood cells - but every one of them is covered with tiny spheres, smaller than bacteria, and not present in any great amount anywhere else in the blood.

These are definitely viruses, and their habit of clustering around white blood cells confirms that they are just the viruses suspected - the recently-cropped-up, apparently unknown in these parts, and highly dreaded Koopa Immunodeficiency Virus.

KIV is not directly harmful to any great degree, but it is nevertheless particularly deadly because it affects the immune system, rendering the host unable to fend it off - or any other diseases, for that matter. Rare cancers crop up at an astonishing rate, weak strains of bacteria are allowed to multiply and take over, and a minor cold becomes a death sentence. A similar disease had been identified not long before in humans in the real world, and it is believed that intimate contact between humans and koopas has caused a form of the virus specific to the koopa species to take over. The rest of the inhabitants of the castle are unaffected because the virus is only transmittable through contact of blood or other bodily fluids, which generally means between lovers, or from mother to child.

So my hypothesis is confirmed. All that remains is to cure it.

After having passed two hours with frenetic, Kaffee-fueled pacing while brainstorming, followed by the destruction of several of my handmade laboratory gadgets, I have assembled a working scale model of a robot, programmed to seek the viruses by spectral signature, and destroy by engulfing them in a micro-sized black hole, and at a rate faster than that at which the viruses can reproduce.

The problem: it is too large by a factor of one million.

However, it would be nearly impossible to construct microscale versions that work the same, since it can't be done by hand. I suppose I can build a shrink ray and a scanning three-dimensional printer to duplicate it, but I am direly pressed for time; it may take a week to build those from scratch, and Larry, having just come down with a deadly case of what would normally be a very mild strain of Birdo influenza, will almost certainly perish in that time frame.

Larry is slumped over on top of the time deceleration incubator where his older yet unhatched siblings lay dormant. He appears soundly asleep, his carapace under the blanket rising shakily with every breath.

One swollen red eye opens, a look of desperation, of desire (albeit faltering) for life, as if to implore me to cure him. How, by magic?

_Magic._


	22. Mushrooms

_"KAMEK!"_

I am nearly knocked over when Kamek swings open the massive doors to the King's bedchamber. A feeble attempt at a roar that comes out rather as a cough erupts from the King's massive bedridden carapace.

"Um, I was wondering... I don't suppose that there is any possibility that the King's illness can be cured by... magic?"

Kamek's wizened scowl, his face sunken from sleepless nights tending to the King, says it all.

I sigh. "Well, then, what IS magic good for?"

"Many, many things lie within the scope of magic, my Prince, but it would take a good while to explain it enough such that you will be able to know the how's and the why's..."

I grit my teeth, regretting having not started my magical training sooner. "WHY DIDN'T YOU TEACH ME EARLIER?!"

"I WOULD HAVE... IF you hadn't been such an ill-behaved little snot when you got here! You only have YOURSELF to blame for that!"

My eyes begin to leak out of anxiety. Kamek is right. Even if I had sound cause to feel the way I did, that was no excuse for allowing my feelings to override my conscientiousness. My brother and my father are going to die, when I could have saved them myself had I not deported myself so callously...

"Why does it even matter? Do you think that YOU could somehow come up with a way to cure viral illness using magic that a Magikoopa with CENTURIES of magical experience, who has crafted quite a few innovations in the field if I do say so myself, cannot?"

"Not at all... as a matter of fact, I believe that your wisdom in the field will come much to my advantage."

Kamek is taken aback. He never expected that I would ever make a statement with that magnitude of HUMILITY.

"I see no reason why magic cannot join forces with medicine to, at the very least, overcome a few technical limitations," I go on.

"Hmmm, I see... but it depends, on what types of technical limitations you are trying to overcome..."

I show him the robot. "This is a working model of a microscale apparatus I have designed that can destroy the viruses and cure the patient. That part is taken care of. I merely require that it be scaled down to submicrometer proportions... oh and duplicated by a billion times, at least."

"So you want it shrunken," Kamek murmured, rubbing his fingers thoughtfully over his scepter. "And duplicated, hmmm... at that size, the duplication should be simple. But in order to shrink it in the first place, I will have to think small. VERY small."

"I... can think small..."

"Not small enough, my Prince. It is not an easy task, if possible at all, to get in a state of mind to think THAT small, without consuming a specially prepared Poison Mushroom potion."

Kamek leads me to a chamber with beautiful door handles, the likes of which I had only seen in one other place in the castle. It is decorated quite cozily with spell books and scrolls alike, decorative skeletons, locked cabinets that I suspect to be full of potion bottles and ingredients, a crystal ball here and there, and a writing desk complete with old fashioned feather quill. The smell is a pleasant mixture of potpourri, old parchment, and fungus mold and other less identifiable scents that I suppose must make up the ingredients.

Kamek pulls out a massive book titled "Magical Fungi of the Mushroom Kingdom: Properties and Potions" in all but faded gold embossment. I cough at the cloud of dust that flies out when he opens it.

"Kamek... isn't this tome just a little... dated?"

"Dated, yes, but perfectly suitable to our purposes. The recipe is ancient, and has never poisoned anybody when prepared correctly."

Kamek turns to a page that identifies several key species of mushroom. The red species, which resembles the real world species known as _Amanita muscaria_, is called a "Super Mushroom". The text reads, '_This species is plentiful in all areas of the Mushroom Kingdom. Although it carries a mild hallucinogenic effect, one which causes most who consume it to experience a sensation of elation or physical largeness, it is non-toxic, and if prepared correctly, makes an excellent dish which promotes growth and muscle mass. Certain enchantments (to be discussed later) can create a fungus that causes those that touch it to instantly double in size, an effect that is undone in the case of acute anxiety or injury.'_

Other mushroom species on the page include the 1Up Mushroom, stated to have macrobiotic effects and, if the correct enchantments are in place, "_the power to resurrect one from a violent death if consumed before such a catastrophe happens"_, and also the Sluggish Shroom, which "_has bradykinetic and tachypsychic effects, making it a popular ingredient in experimental psychiatry_"... and the Poison Mushroom, which resembles the Super Mushroom except for its cap being deep indigo in color instead of red.

_"The Poison Mushroom is a rare species found only in the Lost Levels of the Mushroom Kingdom, and are one of the reasons why those regions are considered uninhabitable. Its effects are opposite to those of the Super Mushroom, and can be used to cancel them out. It is deadly toxic to most life forms, although the effects of the Super Mushroom confer some immunity. 1 Up Mushrooms are a well known antidote. The toxins can be mitigated when prepared properly in certain potions, which confer either a physical or a psychological shrinking effect."_

Everything is clear now. I turn to the page number listed as the one with the recipe for "_A potion to induce a state of mind's eye micropsia_"

"This is the formula you need, correct?"

"Yes, the very one." Kamek begins to rummage his potions cabinet, peering at the potions page every few seconds to refresh his aging memory on what is needed. He shrieks when he realizes I took the scepter and used it to light a fire under the cauldron.

"I only did as the book instructed," I assure him.

"Well, please don't. There are a few things about potion making that the book doesn't warn you about. Now, I'm going to have you prepare a Poison Mushroom. Since a half hour should be long enough to get the job done, one mushroom should suffice…"

I have already found the jar of Poison Mushrooms, labeled with a black skull and crossbones sticker. Kamek gasps as I begin to open it.

"NEVER TOUCH THOSE WITH YOUR BARE HANDS!"

Kamek searches the potions cabinet again and pulls out what resembles a saltshaker, labeled with a five pointed yellow star with eyes.

"Starman dust. This will render you invulnerable to the poison."

Kamek sprinkles some on my hands and, to my bewilderment, they start flashing and glowing like a seizure-inducing scene from a video game.

"As long as they are glowing, you are immune. It should last about ten minutes."

I open the jar and remove a Poison Mushroom, about the size of my fist. "Now what?"

"Detoxifying the mushroom is as simple as causing its eyes to open up."

Eyes, eyes on everything. I look at the mushroom's stalk and find that, contrary to the illustrations in the book, they are tightly shut. I poke at them with one claw. No response.

Kamek shows me to a shelf in the potions cabinet. "Now, would you happen to be able to guess exactly which of these can be used to make the eyes open up?"

I peruse the labels of the many vials on the shelf, and in a few seconds, a vial labeled "Extract of Belladonna" catches my eye.

"I know this can be used to dilate pupils…"

Kamek nods. "Drop just a small dropperful on each eye."

I do so, and I almost drop the mushroom in alarm when the squinting slits open up into wide, glossy black ovals.

"No need to be alarmed, my Prince, the mushroom is not sentient. The only purpose in it having eyes, as far as I reckon, is to detect environmental cues for sporing season."

I attempt to add it to the pot, but Kamek holds me back with his ladle. "Not until I say it is ready."

Kamek stirs some more and lifts the ladle to his nose. He coughs from the steam wafting from it. "All right, now you may add it. GENTLY."

I scoff, as I was already placing the mushroom upon the ladle with the utmost of delicacy. "I am used to working with substances that will blow up in your face if you so much as pour them in the wrong order, Kamek. I believe I can intuit how to handle potions with magical mushrooms."

"Well, this is not the Mad Chemistry lab at your alma mater…" Kamek grumbled. "The potion will be ready when the mushroom has disappeared. Ahem, if I may ask that you watch the pot for a moment, I will be right back, just a quick visit to the little Toadies' room…"

Kamek takes off, carrying his scepter with him to assure that I do not get any wild ideas about what to do with it.

I watch the pot, just as he told me. In particular, I watch the mushroom bobbing up and down in the shallow puddle of broth, its eyes apparently staring back at me. I am suddenly reminded of the clichéd old wives' tale _"a watched pot never boils",_ and wonder if there is some truth to it, at least in this strange, strange universe. Perhaps that is the point. I watch the mushroom intently, making sure it never boils, lest it explode…

POPF! I recoil and cough at the mushroom's reaction to being watched… or boiled. I expect to be coated with a flurry of spores, and open my eyes realizing it was just air, and the mushroom has disappeared completely into the now purplish potion.

This must mean that it is ready now. I am somewhat curious to try the potion, to know how it feels. If the contents here are enough to last thirty minutes, then a small sip should give me just a few seconds' taste of the effects. I bristle with hesitation, knowing that Kamek had not instructed me to do such a thing… but then, he never instructed me not to, did he?

Indeed. That windbag would certainly have instructed me not to if there were any danger in it! I bring a small ladleful to my mouth and blow the gentle steam off it. It smells like a mixture of nightshade, mistletoe, and roasted Portobello mushrooms.

It tastes just as it smells. Astringent, but not disgustingly or overpoweringly so. I feel a wave of dizziness that almost topples me – I sit down, close and rub my eyes, and feel my visual field being sucked away as they open.

Kamek's bookshelf is getting farther away… no, it's shrinking… it's now the size of a bookshelf made for one of those thimble-sized dolls that Wendy likes to play with. I pinch my fingers over it and watch as it becomes smaller still… microsized, now nanosized… and I can still see it just fine…

I turn around at the vaguely registered sound of the door being opened. I cup my claws around nano-Kamek as he walks toward me... becoming larger… and finally normal sized, as the warped spacetime metric in my mind dissipates.

Kamek briefly peers into the cauldron, and turns to me with a cross expression.

"Prince Ludwig, did you sample the potion?"

I nod grudgingly, avoiding eye contact through the hair over my face. Why does he bother to ask? He clearly knows the answer…

Kamek whacks me with his scepter. "Prince Ludwig von Koopa, did I tell you it was all right for you to try the potion?"

I retreat into my shell lest he deliver another blow to my head. "You… you did not tell me I couldn't…"

"In case I haven't made it clear enough for your earth-shattering intellect, you must never, I repeat NEVER, EVER touch or try or sample anything unless I explicitly state that you can! Just because the potion is safe for me does not mean it is safe for you! Have I made myself clear?"

"Yes, Mister Kamek, sir."

"Luckily for you, in this case you should be fine so long as you haven't consumed more than a brief sip or so."

Kamek pours the entirety of the cauldron's small contents into a flask. "All right, now it's your turn to be the master and mine to be the apprentice. Explain to me what exactly it is that you want me to do."

"We should be in the dungeon to do it."

Once in the dungeon, I retrieve a clean feeding syringe and place the virus-killing robot on the table.

"I need you to shrink this down to… approximately a tenth of a micrometer in each dimension. That's a decrease in size to a millionth of each of the original dimensions, or one millionth by one millionth by one millionth, or ten to the power of negative eighteen times the original volume. Do you understand?"

"I'm not as arithmetically ignorant as you might think, my Prince." Kamek stares at the device, rubbing his chin in thought. "How many times do you want it multiplied by?"

"Ten trillion should be enough. And once that's taken care of, I need you to make them go into here." I point into the feeding syringe. "And that should be it."

"Stand back." Kamek pulls the cork out of the flask and downs the entire contents. His body glows a faint indigo, as does the topaz on his scepter.

I watch as he casts this glow onto the machine I made, and watch it as it shrinks to nothing in my eyes, knowing from my own mischievous experience with the potion that he could still see it just fine. I regret not being under the potion's effects myself anymore as he duplicates it before my nano-blind eyes. All I can see is the glow spread into the feeding syringe, which now glows purplish-blue from the inside as though filled with the Poison Mushroom potion itself.

I take a few pipettes full of distilled water and pour them into the mouth of the feeding syringe, to dissolve the nanobots so they flow out easier. Carrying the syringe in trembling yet careful hands, I turn to Larry, passed out in what might have been his last slumber over the incubator.

His puffy eyelids open, exposing the reddened scleras of eyeballs rolled backward in the sockets, still lost in subconscious, as I squeeze his toothy, dribbling mouth open and insert the tip of the feeding syringe. Larry's lips purse instinctively over it, making no protest as I push the contents through. Too late, I realize that in feeding all of the nanobots to Larry I am leaving none behind for my father. I more than likely have time to make another one for him and have Kamek repeat this process. With a shiver, I also suddenly recall some of the last words that Amanda said, before taking off with the bag of loot to check things off her bucket list or dump coins into a casino somewhere, as the last of purple glow in the syringe fades into Larry's mouth.

_"He dies, YOU get to be King."_


	23. Responsibility

I rise from beneath royal blue quilted covers at the ring of an alarm set for six-thirty, as I have every morning this week. I take meticulous care in straightening and folding the quilt neatly over my bed, tucking it in at the corners and placing the pillows, both the decorative ones and the one I rest my head upon, just so over the part that has been folded back.

I feel calm and clear in thought, just as I have since I started a regimen of going to bed as early as Kamek had suggested and rising at an hour that for others would elicit an immediate jab at the snooze button. Perhaps that real worlder who was famous for saying that said sleep habits equate health, wealth and wisdom was on to something.

I head to the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee, making sure there is enough both Kamek's and my copious needs, and then I head to the sibling's rooms to wake them up and have them washed and fed.

Except for Roy's. Clawdia would insist that she be the one to do all that.

Wendy gets her favorite pink cereal, eating it with the color changing spoon that was packed for a childish gimmick inside the box, and Larry is in his high chair, fingering the bland toroidal cereal pieces I had introduced him to. He prefers the pink cereal, but Wendy shrieks if I offer him any.

Morton is running around the kitchen, babbling. "Cheesecake I want cheesecake!"

Hmm, this one does have strong verbal skills. Perhaps he can pick up some German.

"_Käsekuchen_. Say it with me: _Käsekuchen_."

"Kissy kooky what the hell just gimme the cheesecake!"

Well, I tried. I hesitate for a moment to give him the cheesecake for breakfast, but given what I regularly eat for breakfast, cheesecake seems like a healthful indulgence in comparison. I oblige and serve him a slice, warning him to make sure Wendy does not see it.

The bulk of the rest of the day shall be spent with Larry – running tests on his health, administering immune supplements, and assisting with his cognitive and motor skills to help him past his developmental delays. After failing in my attempt to teach him differential calculus, I had thought him to be frustratingly dull, even mentally retarded, as a possible permanent side effect of neonatal illness and possible parental drug abuse. I consulted a book on child development and found out, almost to my gaping horror, that the typical two year old is not equipped even to learn basic algebra. That being the case, Larry seems to be quite caught up in the intellectual department, perhaps even brighter for his age than his siblings. Except that he still has not spoken his first words, despite my encouragement and speaking complete sentences with rich vocabulary to him, which could be a sign of selective mutism, or a social delay, having been largely neglected by both parents from what I have gathered.

As for motor skills, he is making great strides, having learned to walk very quickly once I had gotten his strength up, with the baby formula I had concocted with elevated levels of proteins, docosahexanoic acid, menaquinones, and other nutrients I had deduced he had great need for or deficiency in. He also did not fuss when I switched him from drinking through a latex nipple to straight out of one of my lab beakers, in an effort to curb his early signs of bottle rot. Kamek should have known better.

Overall, I expect Larry to make a full recovery, but he must be closely monitored until he does, and I am the only one qualified to do so. Besides, Kamek requires some rest. It must be exhausting catering to five, well, actually four children, when parental figures are not showing much if any responsibility.

I must be the responsible one. Indeed, should fate remain unhalted, I will be expected to take on responsibilities even greater than domestic labor, so I had best ensure that I am ready for it.

Clawdia is hogging the bathroom with Roy, as she seems to do quite frequently when I need to use it. And Kamek is busy with the sink, washing breakfast dishes, so I cannot bathe Larry in the sink. Larry gives me that face – those anguished eyes and puckered lips, telling me that he needs to do more in the bathroom than take a bubble bath. I had gotten him out of diapers, but he is still in training pants.

I take him into my bedroom, and allow him to relieve himself in the soil of a potted piranha plant.

"Good, very good, now pull them up… you must never do that when other people are watching though, do you understand?"

Larry nods. I let him look through the book on King Ludwig II while I play for him a bit of a tune I had been working on on my violin. It would have sounded better on clarinet, though…

Larry soon falls asleep. I suppose that he does not absolutely have to have a bath today. I place him on my bed and wrap some of the blanket over him, while I settle down in my study chair to read a book on the history of politics.

Kamek knocks softly on the door. "Are you there my Prince?"

I open the door. "Hush… what do you want?"

"You may want to take a moment outside…"

I exit and close the door. I am not worried about leaving Larry alone for a moment on the off chance that he should wake up, for his late development has delayed him from reaching that destroy-everything-he-can-get-his-grubby-claws-on stage known as the terrible two's.

"Your Father has just now been taken to the hospital."

"Oh." I pause, not sure what to make of this, or how to react. "What do you want me to do about it?"

"The King is in critical condition. The doctors say they have never seen a case of influenza like this, especially not in the summertime."

Kamek's voice is heavy. Is he actually grief-stricken at the thought that his abusive bad-tempered boss should perish?

"Well… that's too bad…" My mind wanders off to imagining how a creature as enormous as him could be loaded onto a stretcher and carried to an ambulance vehicle.

"It really is. I-I-I… I just wanted to let you know."

Kamek opens the door and gently walks me back in, pats me as though I were grieving as hard as him, then exits and slowly pulls it to within a crack of being shut.

"I had such high hopes that he would live to see what a King his first born would grow into… well, at least he will die happy, knowing you had already exceeded his expectations and turned out to be everything he had hoped you would be… a monster."

I toss a throw pillow at the door to push the last crack of it shut over Kamek's face. How DARE he, sniveling behind that usual ingratiating tone of flattery, insinuate that the King's death is MY fault, as though I had murdered him with my own claws! I have been FAR too busy with other, equally important things, such as making sure that Larry doesn't die, making sure that Kamek does not KILL himself from taking on so much responsibility, so that the children don't kill themselves doing stupid child things, which also leaves Kamek more time and energy to better take care of the King! That's an entire family and then some of lives at stake here, and he expects me to just make another curebot on top of all that!

Given how fast I had built the original one, and in a state of haste and sleep deprivation too, somehow I doubt Kamek would buy that.

The King probably would have died treatment or no treatment anyway. Larry recovered so quickly because he is young, and his body is small. It would take far longer for the nanobots to destroy all the viruses in the King's body, and even after that is said and done his body would still be ravaged, and being old and large he would recover far more slowly than Larry has. Too slowly, I fear. So slowly that even if I had gotten to him as soon as I had found out what he was ill with, it would not have made a difference. His goose was cooked before I even knew it was in the pot.

Is it wrong that I do not so much as try? Indeed, since it would be a waste of my energies, which at this point should be fully invested in preparations for my imminent reign. I MUST be ready for that, I MUST not let Dark Land down. I must study history, politics, international diplomacy, military strategy, and other kingly subjects that I have been relatively deprived of during my mad science and music saturated childhood.

After preparing lunch for the children, I head to the entrance to answer the doorbell, Larry toddling closely behind.

"How do, may I speak with His Majesty?" asks the visitor, a beefy, bronze-scaled koopa man with a turban and a mustache, standing on a levitating Persian-style rug.

My eyes instantly pop in shock. I should be used to these kinds of strange events by now; still, I had not seen THIS coming. I shut my eyes and clear my throat, overdrawing the moment until I have composed myself.

"The King is indisposed at the moment; in the meantime, you may answer to me, his eldest son, Prince Ludwig von Koopa the First of Dark Land."

"Very well. I am here for Morton."

"Why?" I fail to hide the suspicious tone, although I am already almost certain of who this stranger is.

"UNCLE MORT!" I jump as I hear the young Morton almost roar behind me, nearly bowling me over to meet up with this similarly-hued Desert Lander.

"This is my uncle Morton Koopa Sr. and I get to go visit him and stay over night once a month and we get to go have fun! We go on magic carpet rides and rock concerts and all kinds of adventures don't we?"

The elder Morton smiles, pats Morton on the head and picks him up to seat him on the magic carpet. "Yes we do, Morty boy. He will be back tomorrow at noon, that is, if I have your permission?"

It would be wise of me to verify Morton Sr.'s visitation rights with Kamek. Then again, I am the one in charge, or will be soon anyway, and I should for my own benefit try to be more self-reliant than my father was. Besides, I don't get the feeling that Morton is in any danger of being kidnapped or otherwise abused by this person. I have to wonder, though, when or if he is going to find out that his 'uncle' Morton is not really his uncle.

"Yes, you have my permission. Enjoy your visitation. BUT - "

I seize the tassel of the flying carpet just before it takes off. I am responsible for Morton, so I must ensure that nothing can possibly happen to him… without dire consequences.

I stare him directly in the eyes as I explain it to him. "You will have him back at twelve o'clock SHARP, not a minute later, or your visitation rights will be terminated for one month. If Morton is returned to me showing any signs of bodily or psychological harm, you will be banished from this kingdom PERMANENTLY. If Morton is not returned to me at all, then you will be tracked down and executed. Have I made myself clear?"

Morton Sr. laughs, having not winced once at the threatening conditions upon the younger Morton's visitation. "It's all good. Nothing to worry. See, Morton is happy, aren't you?"

"Yeah! Let's go headbanging!"

Morton's cheer is genuine, so he is certainly being treated well on these visitations, and whatever 'headbanging' is, I am certain I am better off not knowing. I let go of the carpet and wave goodbye as it soars upward.

Larry runs after the flying carpet, arms stretched upward, like a child after a kite that had flown out of his grasp.

"Larry…" I quickly outpace him and pick him up. "That is Morton's family visitation, not yours. When your family comes to visit, then you can go ride off on a carpet with them." I am lying through my teeth, of course. Although I would not be surprised if Amanda had gotten hold of a magic carpet somehow, it would be a hot day in Hell, Norway before she would get unsupervised visitation rights under my watch.

I turn around now to check the mailbox, and I find that Clawdia, who usually makes it her business to do so, has beaten me to it. She is standing next to two stacked packages, ripping open one of the envelopes with her claw, holding a black marker. Larry hides inside his shell, having learned the hard way how unwise it is to leave any soft body parts exposed in her presence.

"Pardon… Clawdia ma'am, is that letter addressed to you?"

"EXCUSE ME? Is that any of your business?" Clawdia huffs, although she is not staring me down in such a frightfully intimidating way as usual. Or since before the King had fallen terminally ill.

"My apologies madam, I'm afraid not. Consider yourself a very privileged consort indeed, to be reading the King's mail on his Majesty's behalf. May I interest you in an anecdote out of the life and times of real world King Henry VIII? He had a very interesting way of dealing with his ill-behaved consorts…"

Clawdia tosses the letter at my face, almost paper-cutting my temple, and storms off without another word.

Yes, that one will have to have a close eye kept on. Larry is quivering in his shell.

I stroke the shell. "You can come out, she's gone now…"

The letter is from a psychiatric hospital, addressed to the resident of Castle Koopa. It is a torn piece of photocopied medical record document, the message written using a blunt-ended red crayon.

"Dear Bowsy Wowsy,

I got put in the freakhouse again! Sorry for not telling you sooner, their free payphone was broken and it took me a long time to find a crayon to write you a letter with and a stamp to send it with. I was put in the M.W.P.H.S.J. ward, and you'll never guess who was my roommate! My roommate was **[CROSSED OUT]** but she was only in for the 72 hour hold. She told me **[CROSSED OUT]** which is what I thought all along! Which is why I haven't **[CROSSED OUT]. ** When your eldest son gets back, tell him to** [CROSSED OUT]. ** Oh and remind him to take care of the eggs for me! I'm afraid I'll be here for a while so I'm not sure if I will be out in time to see them hatch. Tell Iggy and Lemmy that Mommy loves them and get well soon!

Hearts and giggles,

Your precious little Lilly

P.S. I could sure use a big bottle of Everclear if you got any. And some Robootussin. I made a **[CROSSED OUT]** in the broken down toilet."

Clawdia took the liberty of conveniently editing out the parts she considered unfit for the King's, or for that matter, Kamek's or my eyes with that black marker.

Larry is trying to lift the packages, squealing as he fights gravity and digs his claws in the ground in a futile attempt to gain sufficient traction, and then pausing to pant, before switching positions to try again.

I lift the lighter package off the top. It is addressed to "Wendy O. Koopa c/o His Majesty King Bowser Koopa", and addressed from "Emilie Koopa c/o Playkoopa Mansion".

The other package is from Mutter and Onkel. Birthday presents, I suppose. Those will have to wait. Larry gives up trying to push it and follows me as I bring Wendy's package to her room.

"PWESENTS! GIMME!"

"Wait a second!" I push Wendy back as I rip open the package for her. It is full of makeup kits, hair products, high heel shoes, jewelry, and other female vanity products unsuitable for a child of Wendy's age.

Wendy immediately takes a tube of lipstick out, opens it, and smears it over her own face. Then she smears it over Larry's.

When I find a pink envelope with the name "Wendy" scribbled in autograph script, she tries to grab it from me, likely expecting money inside.

"Hold on, I'm going to read it for you!" I open it and show her the sparkly pink cover of the birthday card her mother bought her. The cover reads "Happy Birthday Princess You're 3!"

"But my birthday was in March!" says Wendy as I open the card and hand her the enclosed autographed picture of her mother and Victoria's Shell gift card. Larry meanwhile is exploring the box's contents.

"Wow Mommy's pwetty!" Wendy exclaims as she grabs the photo. " I wanna be just wike her when I gwow up!"

"Over my dead carapace-AHEM…" I peer back into the card, which is stained with lipstick kiss prints and smells of an eau de parfum heavy on synthetic muscone. "Dear precious darling daughter Wendy, Mommy is very sorry that she was too busy touring the cabaret scene to remember to send presents for your birthday. To make up for it, Mommy bought lots of really expensive things with the big bucks she is making. Mommy's living her dream now, and she can buy her little princess anything she wants! Mommy hopes you love everything I bought you, especially the 10,000 coin diamond necklace. Mommy hopes to see you soon! Love always, your super star mother Emilie Koopa. Xxxxxooooooxxooxoxoxoxoxo"

"LET GO THAT'S MIIIIIIINE!" Wendy shrieks. It appears that Larry has found the aforementioned diamond necklace.

"LARRY!" For once, I will have to back Wendy's tantrum. I grab his wrist and pull his fingers apart until he lets go of the necklace, and hand it back to Wendy.

"That wasn't yours!" I reprimand as I exit the room and shut the door, his hand tight in my grasp. "You are not allowed to take other people's possessions! That is thievery, and it is among the lowest of vices and wickedest of sins!"

I let go and head back to the castle entrance to fetch my own package to take to my room, to save to open on my birthday. After that is taken care of, I find that Larry had remained standing in front of Wendy's room the entire time.

"Larry…"

Larry stares longingly at Wendy's bedroom door, utterly forlorn that he had not gotten a present.

"Larry, those were Wendy's late birthday presents. Your late birthday presents will come… later…"

Indeed, I will make it up to him later. But it will have to be later. Possibly, and my greatest apologies should it be so, much much later.

My spine shivers as I allow the many realizations to wash over me. On the one hand, I stand to inherit a position of absolute sovereignty, something that I could never in my wildest dreams hope to attain in the real world, much less my monarch-abolished homeland of Austria. All the trauma of switching homes, of leaving my kind and loving Mutter, my brilliant and wonderful Groβonkel, and my sparkling home in Vienna for the grimy gloom of Castle Koopa, my oafish father, his diseased and demented wives, his ill-mannered children, the nagging if shrewd Kamek… all of that would be made worth it.

On the other hand, I also stand to inherit an adult-sized level of responsibility. I will have a kingdom to run, siblings to raise, an empire to build, enemies to thus conquer… no longer will I have hours upon free hours to study or invent or compose as I please. My childhood, as I know it, is over.

I caress the sobbing, head-hung Larry, and at that last thought, I inwardly chuckle. I had developed at such an astonishing pace that I had never been cut out to have a childhood in the first place. The excruciatingly slow process of childhood development; of, once reaching the physical milestones of walking and talking, learning to count, read, spell, hold a pencil, write, add, subtract… the list of what I had read in those child development books goes on. If that is what having a childhood is about, then I am most grateful to have largely foregone all of that.

This will be my chance to prove to this world that I am mature beyond my years, brilliant beyond all measure, and mighty beyond all expectations.

I suddenly reel at a strange sensation… like a déjà vu; a flashback from a dream I had but had woken without remembering. I am none the wiser what that dream was about, but I have the feeling that the dream was not of a pleasant character at all…


	24. The Conquering Child

It is evening now, and the children are fed and bathed and put to bed. Time for some 'me' time. That is, time to plan my conquest of the Mushroom Kingdom.

I head to the dungeon with a giant rolled-up map of Dark Land and the lands adjacent to it, a conductor's baton, and a tin full of valuable or semi-valuable odds and ends that I had collected over the years. It includes spare Legos, Kinder Egg figures, antique antimony-lead toy soldiers, broken ivory piano keys from the old piano that Onkel had torn up to make into a supercomputer, wooden antique chessmen from a set that Onkel had mostly thrown into the fireplace, half-melted paraffin candle stubs, cubic and octahedral dice blocks, precious and semiprecious stones from jewelry Onkel had melted to obtain noble metals for his experiments, chunks of leftover rare-earth garnets that Onkel had made for his lasers, dead AA batteries, recalled radioactive nuclear pacemaker batteries, still-working motors from small model planes and helicopters Onkel and I had built and taken apart, and toothpicks with international flags I had taken as souvenirs from the many deli places I had visited during family vacations around Europe. Call me a hoarder, but all of those objects may find a use one day, and today is definitely that day.

I clear off a lab table and spread the map over it. I turn to the chalkboard, ready to erase it to draw plans on it… no, too many important equations and scientific data. I turn the chalkboard over, only to find that I had completely covered the other side with things too important to erase as well.

Well, not quite as important as the other side… plus, I had doubtlessly written everything that was important already in my lab journal. So in a flurry I erase it, coating myself and everything in the vicinity with a veneer of chalk dust.

I proceed to shake the dust off my body like a wet animal and cough – I mean, clear my throat. After all, this is a VERY important meeting. What a pity, though, that I had already outgrown all of the outfits that Mutter had sent with me when I moved here, so that I cannot be smartly dressed for it.

I swiftly draw a map of the kingdoms on the board, and then I sharply whack it with my baton.

"ATTENTION! Now, as everyone is already aware of, our kingdom of Dark Land is impoverished… inhospitable… plagued by disease, decay, destruction and doom…" I smirk and chuckle at that bout of alliteration. "despite the fact that, given its rich natural volcanic resources, it COULD be one of the wealthiest nations in this world. Now who do we have to blame for that?"

I saunter back and forth, as best like a cocky military general as I can manage, as though expecting replies from an audience… of nobody.

"That's right! The current King has done NOTHING in the service of the welfare of Dark Land as a whole! He is a despot, a lowbrow TYRANT, guilty of crimes such as polygamy, lechery, theft, embezzlement, child abuse and neglect, and perhaps other things that the good people of Dark Land are not quite so well aware of… anyway enough of that. His reign is coming to an end, and thus, a fresh start can be made."

I whack the board again, this time at the crudely drawn royal castle of the Mushroom Kingdom. "In particular, Dark Land is engaged in a never-ending cold war with the Mushroom Kingdom. The Mushroom Kingdom, or more accurately put, the Mushroom EMPIRE, is immense, and immensely wealthy, and yet all of their spheres of influence were acquired peacefully, rather than through war and siege. In short, the Mushroom Kingdom is wealthy AND peaceful, two factors that would make it seem an attractive and easy target for a vicious warmonging empire to seize, am I right?"

I pause for a moment to place a white King piece at the corresponding part of the map, along with a piece of paraffin with a Belgian flag toothpick driven into it. I got it out of a deli sandwich that was served with Belgium's delicious, delicious fries.

"WRONG! The Mushroom Kingdom may not have a highly mobilized army, but what they do have is size, and resources. Once word gets out that part of the kingdom is under attack, it will not take long for them to mobilize a well-trained and well-armed militia. What's more, the resources will ensure that casualties are few, and those few will recover easily. In other words, the Mushroom Kingdom, as history has proven time and time again, is quite literally a FUNGUS – It spreads and spreads, every bit that you destroy grows back, the more you try to annihilate it the more resistant to your efforts it becomes."

As I speak, I push tin soldiers and game pieces around with my baton to show the imaginary audience exactly what I mean.

"And so how can we s-"

My heart jumps at the sound of the dungeon door creaking open.

"M-my Prince? Who are you talking to?" Kamek starts down the stairs, sets his wand ablaze, and adjusts his glasses as he peers at me and my… well, soon-to-be battle plans. The wizened corners of his mouth curl up into a smirk.

"Hehehe… well well well, so THIS is what you are up to? I half expected an audience of dolls."

I scowl as he cackles. "This is NOT one of Wendy's tea parties."

"Could have fooled me… hehehehehe. Not at ALL what I expected from Your Oh-So-Grown-Up-COUGHalmost-Highness."

If Kamek keeps this up, he is going to find himself six feet under the bubbling surface of a magma pit.

"Ahem… I know you really don't want to hear this, but watching and listening to you marching back and forth, prattling on about your little war strategies, it reminds me so much of the very first time your father got to play-I mean, BE commander-in-chief."

I tap my own hand impatiently with the baton, my sullen glare fixed on Kamek.

"It's, well, a story I never got around to sharing with you. Would you care to hear it now?"

"No thank you, please, that story can wait. I am… busy..."

"Yes… very busy, as I can plainly see." Kamek stifles another cackle. "Hehem… now, eh, I know you believe that you will be GREAT at being King, my Prince, but I, well, um, I must confess, I still have my doubts. I fear that, at this point, there is a possibility that you will not be a very GOOD King."

The old fool! "On WHAT grounds, pray tell, have you made that assumption? Am I not extremely GOOD at everything else that I do? "

Kamek lets out an exasperated sigh, as though I had completely misunderstood the point he was trying to make. He turns around to march out, but pauses for a moment to look at the lab equipment that I had pushed aside. He seems particularly interested in the incubator with the eggs for Lemmy and Iggy inside. He cracks a small, warm smile at them.

"Perhaps there is hope yet." Without another word, Kamek then leaves me to my peace.

"All right… now where was I? Oh yes, I was asking, how can we stop the spread of the glorified slime mold that is the Mushroom Kingdom? Simple. We cut it off from its resources, from the INSIDE."

I place a couple of castle pieces and broken piano keys at the places on the map where I had found that the King had purchased real estate from the Mushroom Kingdom. I had seen photographs, and they are ancient battle fortresses, condemned and absolutely un-rentable.

"These are properties within the borders of the Mushroom Kingdom that belong to the Crown of Dark Land. Shall we fix them up into fully functioning battle fortresses and rent them out to minions to do our dirty work?"

I snicker in the silence. If there were an actual audience here, most of them would probably say yes.

"NO! Have you all no brains? If cleaning up and stocking a BATTLE FORTRESS on the enemy's own property is not an implicit declaration of war, then I have no idea what is! What we shall do, instead, is obtain their favor, and thus influence over them, in a genteel manner, just as they have done to those other lands that they influence. The battle fortresses shall be remodeled into exquisite palaces," I swap out the boxwood castles and cracked pieces of ivory on the map for the more exquisitely palace-like gemstones "and rented out to allies, who shall be allowed to board at these palaces for no cost, except for doing us a few small favors. Espionage, finding out how best to cut off the Mushroom Kingdom from its own supplies, how to obtain such influential positions for the purpose of doing so, and, once the Mushroom Kingdom is sufficiently debilitated, then we shall STRIKE! Fly in on an enormous airship to pour fire and bullets and bombs and lightning! Spreading plagues and SHEER TERROR! WOO HOO HOO! WOO HOO-"

The sound of the dungeon door creaking open again cuts off my manic laughter. Not Kamek, not again…

But when the dungeon door has fully swung open, I see not the robed, pointed-hat silhouette of Kamek, but rather the short, tousle-haired one of Larry.

"Larry! Back to bed!"

Larry ignores me, and proceeds to toddle down the stairs, exhibiting, to my surprise, a good enough degree of motor coordination such that I do not fear that he will fall. Oh well, at least now I have an audience.

"Anyway… now, as you can plainly see, the unfolding of these plans will be several years in the making. That is why it is crucial to start now. As for who will be hired to rent out the later- to-be refurnished battle fortresses, I can think of no better choices to do the job than close members of the family. That means you," I point at Larry, just as he climbs up onto the lab table to look at the mess of mementos I have strewn all over the map. Wide and beady are his eyes at the sight, but his claws tremble with hesitation to touch, doubtlessly because of the incident he had earlier today with the diamond necklace.

"Yes. You and your brothers and sister will be brought up to be proper lady and gentlemen, just as your eldest brother, yours truly, had been. You all shall receive the finest education from the finest tutor, again yours truly, that you could possibly hope for. Your talents shall be discovered, honed and polished, and put to their best use. And when the day comes that you are all developed and trained enough to assist me… well, actually, that bridge is best left uncrossed until arrived at. Now, are there any questions?"

Indeed, there are.

Larry stands up, makes perfect eye contact, and asks, "Where's Mama?"


	25. The Truth

I am nearly floored by Larry's inquiry.

Firstly, this is the first time I have heard him speak intelligible words. As a matter of fact, it was a scarce moment that I had heard him so much as babble. And here his first words come out with clearer pronunciation than Roy, two years his senior, could certainly manage.

Secondly, I am at a loss as to how to respond, as I have no answer to his question…

"Where's Mama?" Larry repeats.

"She… Your mother Amanda… she went off somewhere to some place to have a good time before she… goes to a better place." He need not be told what that 'better place' is. "That's all I know."

"Oh." Larry sat down and turned his gaze off into space for a moment, as if thinking of what to ask next. I reach for my mug and take a long swig of Kaffee.

"She sick like King Daddy?"

I gasp in midsip, and some of the lukewarm fluid goes down my trachea. I cough for several seconds, spraying salivated coffee everywhere. Now THAT was even more alarming than Morton Sr.'s magic carpet!

"She… yes. She is sick, just like your father."

"When will Mama and King Daddy get better?"

"I… cannot say when…" This is not a complete mistruth. One technically cannot say when, after all, if the time in question does not exist…

Now, where was I? I turn around to the chalkboard, trying to remember where I left off, hoping that Larry had decided he had asked enough questions for tonight. I have more conquests to plan, after all! I will require a formidable supply of nuclear fuel and weapons if I expect to threaten the Mushroom Kingdom into submission. I can get this from the natural uranium deposits of Sarasaland, provided I figure out a way to break their truce with the Mushroom Kingdom and get them to form an alliance with Dark Land, but that I can leave to figure out for later. My other option is to get to Star Road and figure out how to recycle the vast reserves of radioactive waste that are dumped there. The Star Road nuclear waste repository can only be accessed through portals located at top-secret locations around Dinosaur Land. Dinosaur Land is said by some historians to be the long-abandoned birthplace of Koopa civilization, and since it is unruled and full of uncivilized inhabitants it should be mine for the taking. This castle happens to have a book in the library that details all five of the secret locations of the Star Road portals, so Star Road is mine for the taking as well.

"Lud?" Larry asks. Silly child! Can he not see that I am in the middle of writing my own history book! To be technical for the moment, drawing a small but detailed map of the kingdoms and marking important locations with pentagram stars. Next up is the BeanBean Kingdom. Since that is the breadbasket for the Mushroom Kingdom as well as many other kingdoms, that will have to be slashed and burned…

"Ludwig?"

Larry pronounced my name the way it is supposed to be pronounced; a rare, even insurmountable feat for most of the others in this castle. For that, I suppose he deserves another moment of my attention.

"What is it, Lawrence?"

Larry crawls across the map on the table while looking up at me with wide, limpid eyes. "Are Mama and King Daddy ever coming back?"

I freeze. The chalk slowly slides from the grip of my now-limp fingers, until it is released to snap upon the dungeon floor. Is it possible that this toddler, who had, in spite of sickness and silence, picked up on so many things that should have been beyond him, might possibly have fathomed the truth?

Larry deserves an answer. He DEMANDS an answer. But what answer shall he get? Shall I sugarcoat the truth, tell a white lie to spare his tender, impressionable feelings? Just as Mutter had done instead of telling me, before seeing me off down the pipe to Dark Land, that_ I_ wasn't ever coming back?

My throat feels tight as my eyes unconsciously dart around in their orbits, my mind trying to come up with the RIGHT thing to say.

"The truth is… Larry… that your mother and father are never, ever coming back… … …unless I bring them back."

"Oh. Bring them back!"

Larry smiles, his tail wagging like a puppy's. Cute. He thinks bringing them back is that easy…

"It's not quite that easy, Larry. Your mother and father are very sick. They cannot come home until they are all better."

"Make them better! Like me! I'm all better!"

My hands wring over the conductor's baton. "They are not little like you, Larry. Big Koopas take a much longer time to get better."

"Longer? How much longer?" Larry's smile falters a bit.

"Could be much, much, MUCH longer. Might even be an INFINITE amount of time longer."

"…infi… in… fin… infinini… infinite? That means forever…"

I have told him too much. Time in the limit of infinity IS forever. Seems Larry had picked up something from that premature calculus lesson after all. He pouts and stares down at the table, his lower lip quivering, until tears fall upon the tabletop.

I pull a handkerchief from my shell, a very nice one that Mutter had embroidered my name on, and rub it over his red, wet cheeks. He sniffles as mucous tears drip from his nose. As hot as my face now feels, I hope that he cannot tell how red my face has become as well…

"So… so no birthday presents from Mama?"

My throat tightens even more as I recall the amount of loot Amanda had so selfishly raided from this very dungeon. Surely she could have spared some small gift for her own child?

But wait… I play the incident back in my memory… a few coins had spilled from that bag. I walk over to the spot where I recall the coins spilling out and find that, indeed, the coins are still in the exact locations where they had fallen, dully glinting in the dungeon torchlight.

"Larry… your mother has in fact left you a birthday present."

I pick the coin up and show it to him. "She got a bunch of coins, and she left this one just for you."

Larry's eyes glow with ten times the luminosity that they had upon the sight of the diamond necklace worth ten thousand times as much. He reaches eagerly for it with both hands, staring at his reflection in the golden, firelit surface, then pressing the cool metal against his face.

"Now, will you go back to bed?"

"Yes." Larry hops down from the table and runs to the stairs, still holding the coin in both hands and staring into it like a mirror. He only takes his eyes off of it for one moment when he reaches the top of the stairs.

"Good night, big brother Ludwig."

"Good night," I murmur hesitantly.

After Larry has swung his little crack of a door opening shut, I heave with a massive sigh. It comes out almost a scream, almost a… sob? Nein, a hiccup from the Kaffee earlier going down the wrong pipe, that's all…

I inhale a few more breaths, shallow breaths, but for a heavy few… my stance falters, and my face falls chin-first upon the lab table. The bone in my chin is nearly cracked by a small Lego that I had joined to a few others to make a castle for the map with. But I would not be greatly distressed had that been the case, for right now, I feel too… empty. Empty and sickened. Or maybe that is just the knot in my stomach, but the reason for that is not anything I ingested, that I know for sure.

My eyeballs burn. My brain burns. Well, not my brain so much but my mind. My eyes are squinting tight from the ache. To feel this way, so suddenly, especially when things are all starting to fall in place for me, is such a cruel, unfair joke, and, by nobody's fault but my own, I just might have to live with it.

There will be no sleep for me tonight.


	26. Two the Thirteenth

It is almost eight in the morning. Not for the first night, but for the first night in a week or so, I have burnt the midnight oil and conquered all urges to succumb to the lulling circadian rhythm. Admittedly, the siren song of melatonin has been stronger after having gotten in the habit of getting a good night's sleep, but a strong dose of coffee is enough to make it to 2 AM, and if one can make it over the hump of 2:30 AM, they can surely persevere until dawn .

The high of running a deficit in sleep debt has fueled the creation of a simple hemodialysis machine, constructed out of basic laboratory equipment, but with a semipermeable membrane lasered with nanosized perforations. It works with blood and also urine, as I have tested with samples of both, obtaining the maximal yield of just the product I have been seeking to filter out.

And now, to try it on a living being.

"Oh LARRY," I call, trying to suppress the creepily saccharine tone in my voice, and the accompanying ebullience of giggles. I have trained Larry to come when called, and come he does. Tired and hungry, but that is all the better for the operation of this machine.

Larry does not fuss about having the needles attached to tubes pricked and taped to his wrists, as he has been quite used to having his blood drawn over this past week or so that he has been in remission. However, his eyes widen with a hint of fear amidst the wonder at the sight of the spiraling tubes of red arching over his head, and he whimpers with confused worry at the sight.

"Yes, that's your blood, Larry. Get over it... Hold still!" I tell him when he raises his hands to cover his eyes. "If you mess this up, there won't be time to genius up another cure! You don't want to become an orphan, do you?"

Larry shakes his head and sits down as I watch the clear by-product of the filtered blood drip into a liter-sized beaker.

I had designed the nanobots to have a half-life of about two weeks in the body, more than long enough to eliminate all viruses or other pathogenic particles in a small body, after which they are excreted in one way or the other. I could have designed them to be even more persistent, so as to aid the means of recovery, were I not in a rush.

I wait for several minutes, reprimanding Larry when he lifts his hand again to point inside his mouth to indicate desire for breakfast, until the drip is slow enough that I can assure that I have removed more than 99.9% of the remaining nanobots in the body. That is all that is worth the time and effort to recover, but still not enough to eradicate all of the viruses from the body of an adult Dragon-Koopa at a rate faster than that at which the viruses reproduce, even including the nanobots I had salvaged from Larry's blood and urine samples.

"All right, Larry, you're done." I detach him from the mess of tubes, escort him to the dining room, and fix him a bowl of Wendy's favorite pink cereal, since Wendy has not been up and fed yet. It is still rather early to attend to that; right now, I must genius up a way to make more nanobots.

THINK, Ludwig, if you can graduate Frankenstein University in four months, then this should be a piece of _Sachertorte. _Shall I ask Kamek? _Nein_, I would rather not have the curmudgeon poke his nosy old nose into my business this time. I can handle this myself. THINK...

My original blueprint for the nanobots was for them to replicate by assembling other identical units out of raw materials in the environment. I had left this feature out of the one I built to cure Larry because, asides from the time constraint, I knew it was hazardous for them to make replicas out of the raw materials in Larry's body.

But what if I make just ONE small nanobot that can insert the necessary code into the others, to program them not only to replicate but to insert the code into the others! And this programming should shut off when I deliver an electric signal... I grind the gears in my brain to figure out just how to do this...

Got it.

I fabricate the one tiny nanobot inside an empty beaker, using nanolasers and a photomask I fashioned out of DNA fragments in a polymerase chain reaction. When I am sure that it is done, I pour the beaker of salvaged nanobots into it, as well as some raw materials - graphite dust I got from pencil shavings, various metal ions in solution, and colloidal gold, which I obtained from one of the wives' wedding rings - and stand by to watch and wait. Woohoo! and giggle. This is really very exciting; like a chemical reaction, only vastly more complicated; I would call it, say, a metachemical reaction, and an intelligent one at that.

I wonder how long this will take? Surely the rate of nanobot formation can be formulated as a function of the concentration of each of the raw materials, and how well the nanobots can steer themselves against the Brownian motion of the particles in the container. The nanobots require no battery, as they can scavenge all the energy they need out of the environment. A live body, however, has far more energy than a beaker at room temperature, and according to my calculations, a quick warmup over the Bunsen burner should increase the reaction rate immensely.

I do so, being careful not to heat it enough to make the environment too chaotic for the nanobots to assemble anything, and I erase the war plans off of the chalkboard to make room for calculations. Given the initial concentration, and the rate at which it increases, which is a function of temperature, concentration of raw materials... this is no exercise one could find out of any current textbook. I first must establish a few principles... now then, the time required to obtain a large enough dosage is... oh. It's done now.

I dip a cathode and an anode into the beaker and apply enough voltage to shut off the nanobots' replication feature.

After putting a slide of the liquid under the electron microscope to make sure the concentration of nanobots is as predicted - and indeed, I find that it is - I pour the contents into an Erlenmeyer flask, seal it with a cork, and place the flask in my shell.

"Good morning, Kamek," I tell him after he has waken up and groggily made his way at an old cripple's pace to the kitchen. I hand him a mug of my strongest Kaffee.

"Mmh, you do make good coffee, my... eh, Prince." Kamek inhales the steam and takes another sip. "What is it that you want this morning?"

"Kamek, I wish to visit the hospital."

"Eh?" Kamek almost jumps in surprise. "Oh, so you do intend on seeing your father one last time before he..."

"Indeed, I do," I reply curtly.

"All right, then," Kamek cackles and waves his wand, summoning his broomstick to come flying out from wherever he keeps it. Still cackling, almost sadistically, he mounts it. "Hop aboard!"

I almost groan, but knowing the alternative is the Monster Bowser truck, I reluctantly hop aboard. Almost as soon as I do, the pitter-patter of the smallest pair of Koopa feet in the castle reaches my eardrums.

"Larry! Go play!"

But Larry tugs at the straws of the broomstick, trying to climb aboard.

"Kamek, it appears that Larry wants to go. Shall we bring him along?"

"Eh, why not? Just make sure to hold on to him tightly."

I lift Larry and hold him hunched over the broomstick, squashed against my chest while my hands clench the handle.

As the broom takes off, I do not feel as sick or frightened as I did the last time. Rather, I feel exhilarated, even at home here in the smoky clouds. I gaze down upon my future kingdom, littered with miniaturized fortresses and abandoned war vehicles like pieces over a game board. Poorly played, your soon-to-be-fallen Highness...

Kamek's broom descends as he prepares for a landing over an area that I recognize... the high spike-topped walls, which I stretch my neck to peer over, but Kamek's broom descends beneath that altitude before I can have a decent look inside the walls of the asylum.

"Kamek, why is the King being treated for influenza inside a psychiatric hospital?" I ask after the broom has landed in the parking lot. Larry is stumbling around, his face pale with nausea.

"He's not, he's... eh?"

Larry has buried his head inside Kamek's coat pocket to vomit in it.

"Blech..." Kamek shakes his wand, to magically clear the vomit from it, I presume. "Anyway, your Father is at the general practitioning part of the hospital, which is over there."

Kamek points at the other side of the parking lot.

"Oh. Part of the same complex as the psych ward. How... convenient."

"Ehehe, not only that, but they offer dental, chiropractic, optometric, podiatric, geriatric, pediatric, and veterinary care at that hospital as well."

"Do they? May I ask, what is the quality of care like?"

"Eeeeh.." Kamek fumbles his fingers over his wand, which I now know is an indication that he is struggling to come up with a euphemistic way to describe something that is absolutely wretched. "The hospital is minimally funded, and most of the employees are cheaply hired immigrants from SubCon. But the funeral home across the street is quite wealthy."

Figures. I repress the impulse to curl my lips and snicker at how the King is now receiving his just desserts, his karmic comeuppance. What goes around has indeed come around...

The last time I was in the waiting room of a medical clinic in Vienna, it was spacious, well-decorated, with fine music playing on the radio and medical journals to read, which almost took my mind off the anxiety of knowing that my teeth were going to be deeply excavated that day. This waiting room, by contrast, is even more cramped and noisy than the one at the psychiatric hospital on the other side of the parking lot. The parents make no effort to discipline their children, the television is airing some pablum for toddlers even though none of them are paying any attention to it, and the only reading material is short educational pamphlets for laypeople with titles such as "What is the Goombola Virus and How to Prevent it" and "How Vaccines Work and Why You Should Have Your Children Immunized". Overall, the atmosphere is an intensely stressful one, such that I almost feel like screaming myself. Larry is feeling unnerved as well, and he begins to make noise as in imitation of the other children.

"Shush! You stop that!" I growl at him. I will not bring my siblings up to be screaming brats.

With a sigh, Kamek turns from the receptionist. "It's not quite visiting hours yet, my Prince. What do you suggest we do in the meantime?"

Clearly, he is not comfortable waiting for long in here either. However, I need to make my own visiting time, so he will have to be kept busy. I dart my eyes around and think fast...

"Oh! Um..." I grab the vaccine pamphlet and hand it to him. "While we're here, why don't you make an appointment for Larry to have his immunizations, now that he has a functioning immune system with which to benefit from them?"

I feel Larry's hand twitch with fear in mine. I respond with a firm and reassuring squeeze.

"Eh? Well, that's a swell idea, good thinking!" Kamek turns toward the receptionist, then turns back.

"Say, how about you, do you need any shots?"

"No thank you, Kamek, _Mutter_ has me quite up-to-date on mine."

"Very well then... oh, how about a dental appointment, shall I schedule one for you while we're here?"

"No thank you, Kamek, I've already had my two check-ups for the year," I lie.

"Are you sure? How about an eye exam, or a hearing exam, or a pros-"

"ALL OF THOSE ORGANS OF MINE ARE PERFECTLY FINE, KAMEK." I slap my head at what was almost a moment of mutually embarrassing senility. "I'll be in the restroom, I believe Larry needs to use it." I discreetly nudge Larry, and he puts his hand to his training pants and fidgets. Kamek nods and carries on with his business, and I lead Larry out the waiting room exit into the hallway.

The hallway is barren, with bleak and stony white walls, lit by torches like a whitewashed replica of the dungeon at home. An effort to keep the halls clean has been made at least, but the floors are permanently imbued with nondescript faint brownish stains that, as my twisted mind too soon realizes, were probably a much brighter color when they were first made. The odor is stale and sterile; of dirty mops that ran over the floor and walls with bleach and ammonia... and, much longer ago, possibly cyanide...

I walk briskly, ignoring Larry's panting as he struggles to keep up. The elevator cannot be too far... Please let there be an elevator and not just a staircase...

What a relief - an elevator just to the left of the fork at the end of the hallway. Granted, an out-of-date one that will likely fall apart soon if not maintained well, but it opens at the press of a button, and all of the buttons inside are labeled with the names of the treatment provided on that floor.

From the very bottom, underground floor, labeled "Mortuary"... to the next, labeled "Parking Lot - Staff Only"... the next, rather pointless sub-floor, "Parking Lot - Mezzanine"... this floor, "Receptionist and Urgent Care"... the next one up, "Cafeteria/Veterinary Clinic/Emergency Room" - real bright idea, placing the ER on the second story instead of the first... "O&G/Radiology" - even MORE brilliant, make sure new mothers AND their children have extra radiation exposure... "Isolation/Quarantine/Neonatal Intensive Care Unit", housing patients with infectious diseases on the same floor as the sickly and premature infants, now if THAT doesn't take the cake...

If Larry's mother is anywhere in this hospital, it would be at the top floor, "Hospice/Endodontic Therapy". The aroma of rotten pulp, plus a symphony of drilling and screaming a few rooms over, what a lovely place to die.

Of course Amanda would be there. She may be committed to suicide, but she would have been detained before she got that far. As a matter of fact, I am CERTAIN that she was recently detained - it's all a matter of putting the pieces together - which reminds me, I should drop by the M.W.P.H.S.J. ward sometime to visit Lilly, and set a date for her to witness her sons' hatching. Anyway, after the staff at the psych ward found out that she has KIV and hepatitis and probably Kooposi's sarcoma metastases on her liver, a likely cause of the hepatitis, she would have been immediately transferred to hospice.

She still has some months to live. I would have to genius up something else to cure her of everything else that the immunodeficiency syndrome had allowed her to become afflicted with, but what's most important now is that the viruses have to go first.

Fine example of womanhood that she is, Larry still seems to have at least marginally more memory of and attachment to her than to his other parent. With his very first words, he asked about HER, and only later did he ask about the other parent. That does not say much for the other parent, does it?

I take Larry inside the elevator and press the button to the thirteenth and highest story - no real world superstition about skipping the unlucky prime number when labeling the buttons. It would almost seem that 13 is even considered lucky in this world.

"Be on your best behavior, Larry - we're going to seek your mother."


	27. Heave Ho

Larry's eyes pop when the elevator door opens at the top floor. To his mind, the elevator must have seemed like a door that closes and magically opens up to another room. I must admit, however, that the stark contrast between the scenery on this floor and that of the first floor had startled me a bit as well.

This floor is warmly decorated, with flowery wallpaper and still life oil paintings of flowers and bowls of fruit. A basket of potpourri sits atop a glass table on brass legs that resemble a goose's at the bottom. The ambience is broken only by a sign with arrows labeled "Operating theater" as well as "waiting room" to the left and "hospice" to the right. I take a deep breath and head toward the left; a worthy reason to go over there first has just occurred to me.

The waiting room has the same unnerving refrigerator temperature as any dental clinic. The first thing I notice is that, like that specialty dental clinic I went to in the real world, this one has an enormous and elaborate aquarium in the waiting room, full of Bloopers and Cheep Cheeps and other marine fauna of this world that I have read about, obscuring the grisly view of the operating theatre on the other side of the wall. Well, this pretty much proves it, that the fetish for exotic marine aquariums among those in the dental profession is universal.

Larry meanwhile is digging into a basket full of sugar-free lollipops on the counter, but he soon notices the aquarium and runs over to ogle it.

I snatch the saccharin sucker out of his hands. "Don't eat that rat poison!"

Larry cries. I groan and throw it back at him. "Fine then! Go on! Learn the hard way!" The vile taste of saccharin shall be plenty of punishment for crying in public. Sure enough, he spits the candy out at the fish tank, where it sticks while slowly sliding off.

I stand and wait and pretend to stare at the fishes while waiting for the foggy glass door to the room on the other side to swing open.

The door opens, and I hear muttering in a language that I have not even a meager understanding of, which greatly annoys me. Shyspeak. It's a Shy Guy - one of the peoples of SubCon that Kamek was telling me about being employed here - and it's wearing a surgical outfit and pushing a trolley with an empty tray that I can only presume will soon be loaded with torture - I mean, dental instruments. I take Larry's hand, motion for him to be quiet, and we tiptoe in surreptitious pursuit.

Muttering one of a pair of alternating syllables in Shyspeak that together sound like "heave-ho!" with each plodding step, the Shy Guy is irritatingly slow at leading us to the room where it disappears inside to fetch the tools. I stand and wait on one side of the hallway, and Larry does the same on the other side, so that we have the Shy Guy cornered when it comes out. Now that's my brother.

The Shy Guy takes more time than is to my liking, but eventually it exits the room with the required instruments. I leap on top of the trolley, spreading my claws, baring my fangs in a twisted grin.

The Shy Guy leaps, trembling, turns around but finds that Larry is also baring his claws and fangs. I giggle slightly when I see a syringe loaded with anesthetic on the tray. Just what I was looking for.

I jab the needle in the creature's temple, pushing the fluid through the needle at a pressure that would be injurious to a more tender life form. The Shy Guy is passed out before the last drop has sunken into its red hide.

I remove the empty fluid cartridge and discard it, as I will need this syringe later. Oral delivery of the nanobots may not be sufficient for an adult Koopa - the bioavailability is greater when delivered subcutaneously. I cannot say whether or not the Shy Guy will survive the dose of anesthesia I delivered, for I know nothing of Shy Guy physiology, but either way, this is MY kingdom, so I can slaughter as many of MY troops as I want.

I dip the needle into the bottle of antiseptic on the tray - no way of knowing what might be shared off of this needle. Larry is already playing with the instruments. He drops the mouth mirror that he was ogling and picks up a slightly blood-crusted K-file, his eyes gleeful with... perhaps I am imagining, malice...

"LARRY! Put that down!" I shout, stiffening at the impulse to flinch. I yank him down from the tray. The sooner we are out of THIS section of the hospital, the better.

The hospice is not that well separated from the endodontic section. There are two hallways, one for patients with last names that begin with "A" through "L", and the other for last names beginning with "M" through "Z".

Amanda's last name was... Napalm? Somehow I get the feeling that Napalm is a pseudonym of sorts, as those who perform for a living as she had often assume one. Still, it does not hurt to check...

The name I read on the first door is "Magikoopa, Agnes". Kin of Kamek's perhaps? I am curious to know exactly what she is dying from... but I have more urgent business to attend to.

I pass "Mamu, Wart" and "Mole, Montgomery III" and several empty rooms and finally an occupied one with an "N" name.

It reads "Noki, Mare". That would come after "Napalm, Amanda"...

I fall upon my plastron and sigh. Of course, I might have had better luck checking under her married name "Koopa"...

"Larry, come." I push myself up and run back to the hallway's entrance. "Your mother should be in the other hallway."

The first occupied room I encounter is "Bean-Bean Mung". The room smells ghastly - a blend of roadkill and rotten peas. The occupant does not appear to be breathing; I wonder how long it has been since the staff have checked it.

I quicken my pace - past "Bass, Bertha" - I hold my breath at the stench of rotting trout - and "Blumiere, Bleck" and other empty and occupied rooms until I reach the K's, at which point I slow down and pay attention.

"Kong, Kranky, Sr."... "Koo, Koopatricia"... At last I find a "Koopa", but the name starts with a B, which means that Amanda is not filed here under the name "Koopa". Perhaps she is filed under a different name. Perhaps they even made an error with the alphabetical order... that would not surprise me one bit. I am amazed that the staff here even know as much as the alphabet.

"Larry..." But his hand slips out of my unexpectedly sweaty palm. I have, in my younger days, bungled quite a few piano recitals due to my fingers being slippery with perspiration, before I had overcome my mild performance anxiety. I have up until now kept a cool head, even through the quite triggering environment of THAT part of the hospital, but right now I realize that my brow is hot, I can feel the sensation of my heart pounding my skull like a timpano, and my arm, as I reach back to take Larry's again, is trembling...

Past the sickening noise of my own heart beat, I almost miss the sound of groaning in the "Koopa" room. The sound of a voice so familiar, even my youngest sibling recognizes it.

Larry prods the door, and it swings open. He chirps, "Daddy?"

"That's... that's King Daddy to you..."


	28. Deathbed

"Larry..."

But I am too faint to stop him.

The patient is shrouded in the lacy curtains of a King-sized canopy bed. A giant television is softly blaring the coverage of some Mushroom Kingdom sports game. The nightstand is covered with a Fire Flower bouquet and various medicine containers. RoBootussin and codeine syrup and the foil of punched-out antihistamine tablets and a prescription bottle of Shroomicillin, which is sheer idiocy on the doctors' part, as antibiotics are absolutely useless against viral infections. But in a hospital where root canals are gouged out with bloody and unsterilized instruments, why should I be surprised...

Larry crawls under the canopy, and I can see the bump of his shell rise up behind it as he climbs up onto the bed. What am I supposed to do now... well, I suppose it is only proper that I hear out His Majesty's last words. Any good King would do the same, would they not? I would presume, but I am still very new to this role...

I pull back the canopy and leap unto the comforter. The heavy curtains fall shut behind me, blocking all light sources from the interior. I reach out to the nightstand to grab a Fire Flower. This bouquet includes both the blue ones that grow in the Mushroom Kingdom and the orange, tulip-shaped variety that is endemic to Dinosaur Land. The one I hold is a blue one, which glows just brightly enough to see Larry's face as well as the lump of His Royal Carcass beneath the quilt.

I am standing on it.

I feel the mound rising beneath my feet as the soon-to-be-fallen King takes a deep, labored breath, almost a snore.

"My... my sons... Roy? Morton?"

"No, Bowser." I pace up to his chest and hold the flower over his face. Even in the dim blue Fire Flower light I can see the signs of illness in his face; the sunkenness, the pallor, the sores on his cheeks, the inflammation near his nose and eyeballs and lymph nodes. I reel at his breath, which assaults my olfactory with the cadaver-stench molecules being formed by the putrefying noma that is just beginning to rankle in the soft tissues of his face. I rescind my previous sentiment about the Shroomicillin.

I put my claws to his puffy eyelids and pull them open. They are swollen and pink with infectious conjunctivitis, rolling dazed in their sockets. He is still conscious, just barely, _barely _conscious...

"It is I, Prince Ludwig von Koopa the First. The Crown Prince. Your eldest issue. Your _Heir_."

"Ludwig..." He groans and twists his neck in agony, more, it seems, at the memories and thoughts dredged up by that name than at the physical discomfort of the lymphatic swellings in his neck.

I scramble as Bowser rolls over to his side. Larry stumbles and falls off the edge of the bed. I help him up as he climbs up the quilt he had caught on the side after falling over.

"My son... my firstborn..." he mutters, his voice distant, almost practically talking in his sleep. "He... I... I wanted my first born to be the... the King I never was... the King I was never meant to be..."

Well, he certainly got his wish. Hearing him speak of me in third-person feels a little like eavesdropping, but I continue to listen.

"I... I made quite a mess. My own parents were hardly ever in my life. I had to rule at a very young age... Too, too young... when I finally started to grow up a bit, the once-glorious kingdom of Dark Land had become... a glorious nothing..."

I see. He had never gotten around to telling me _that_ story...

"As I said I... I had finally decided to grow up some and... and settle down, and start a family. A great big happy harem, as is Koopa family tradition..."

A tradition that he as absolute ruler had the power to abolish, but did not. And he is now paying for it, ever so dearly...

"But... but the first born... the heir... I wanted to make sure to do it right. I even asked Kamek to use his hocus-pocus... that woo to find me the right one... and she... she took off with my firstborn... but I allowed it. I allowed it because that for the time being was best for the Prince, best for the kingdom."

I gasp a little, shocked. Just a little. Or maybe a lot...

"I... I couldn't just leave my first son over there in the land of frilly pants and powdered wigs and pianos forever... the Crown Prince of Dark Land must be raised in Dark Land, to know Dark Land tradition and laws from an early age. I fought and I fought to have my son back... and I got him back."

My eyes narrow in resentment. My breath is tense and coming out in snorts. "Go on," I mutter, despite knowing that he is too far gone on sedative medications to respond.

"I was overjoyed to have my eldest son living here in the castle with me and his brothers and sisters. But he... he just didn't seem happy. He was miserable all the time. All he wanted was to lock himself in his room and make frilly pants music all day. He didn't get along with his siblings... he... I tried everything... I took him to the damn shrink... I made him go out and play with his siblings... I even ordered Kamek to fill the Castle library with the kinds of books he likes since he knows better about that kind of academical stuff than I..."

Oh, so he... noticed. Well, it was more than obvious how miserable I have been, but I had not quite given him even that much credit.

Bowser releases a heavy, phlegm-choked sigh. "I think he never really even saw me as a father. I guess I couldn't blame him for missing his mother. I should've... should've taken Kamek's advice... should've gotten to know my son better. Should've gotten to know all my kids better. The youngest one... Larry..."

Larry runs across the covers to meet his father's diseased face. "Here I am King Daddy!"

Bowser raises his eyelids some. "Larry? Is that you? You're..."

Larry nods. The corners of Bowser's gangrenous snout rise, as best as he can manage, into a smile. His eyes say it all... that at this moment he is, in spite of it all, overwhelmed by joy and gratitude to see his youngest son walking and talking, a moment that he had surely up until now been certain that neither he nor Larry would live to experience.

Bowser's face suddenly twists into a grimace, and he roars, shallowly and wheezily, in agony. His face falls to the side, and the air remaining in his lungs sighs out in a gentle gust.

I blink. Several seconds pass. No palpable pulse or exertion of breath.

Larry tugs at his father's face. "King Daddy? You're gonna be all right! Wake up! King... Daddy? Pappa?"

Quite calmly, I wonder... if this is... it?

I jump, my feet alarmed by a sensation from beneath the quilt. A heart beat.

Bowser yawns, and, not without much tossing, turns over onto his back.

"My... fault... I blamed the wives... but I am the King after all so everything... I shoulder the blame for everything..."

Yes, everything IS your fault. I nod with satisfaction. Finally he admits it.

"I... I really don't deserve... but I... all the things I'll never get to do with him... I will never get to take him on an airship cruise... never get to camp out together, never get to go conquer other kingdoms together... his birthday is soon. I won't get to see the look on his face when he sees what I got him..."

Bowser's voice is choked with fresh grief at that last part. "I never even heard Ludwig say 'I love you'"...

"I love you King Daddy!" Larry hugs and nuzzles his cheek.

I... have nothing to say to him... he has, after all, done nothing to earn my respect or affection. Perhaps he very sincerely tried, but his efforts were an abysmal failure, and in my book, effort deserves no marks until it produces results. The compassionate thing to do, at the very least, would be to pat his head and tell him that it is not his fault, but that would be an egregious lie.

"All the things you don't realize until it is too late..."

Indeed. So it is true then; that when one is dying, one's words become steeped in the well of infinite wisdom, as has been portrayed in every deathbed scene of every play, movie or novel I have ever watched or read. He is speaking not to me, but to the being of the light at the end...

Sweet Larry, blissful in his infantile ignorance, patting and stroking Bowser, seemingly unbothered by his death odor, to assure him that he will recover. "You will get well soon King Daddy just like I did! We have come to make you all better!"

Larry looks up at me, smiling, his eyes wide and trusting, sparkling even in the Fire Flower's dull glow. At this age, he will follow me everywhere, and, even when I am brandishing needles at him, he will trust me with his life. He has not the slightest inkling that saving his father's life is , and has been since our arrival at this hospital, the furthest from my intentions.

We came here to save his mother. Ideally both parents, or that is the way that he would have it anyway; I have no problem whatsoever with allowing his female parent to remain alive, but it just so happens that the father's impending death is a very serendipitous event in my favor, and my number-one mission objective is to stand by and allow it to happen.

There is no use in denying that to myself for any longer.

Admittedly, my hopes that Amanda would be present at this hospital were all wishful thinking. She may already be buried for all I know. I cannot be blamed in the slightest for failing to save her though, as she has even taken great pains to make herself unavailable. Bowser, on the other hand, is not going anywhere. It would even be a lie to dismiss him as a lost cause at this point, being the very capable genius that I am, and have proven to be time and time again.

I withdraw my arms into my shell and pull out the dental syringe in one hand, and the vial of antiviral nanobots in the other. If these could deliver Larry from the brink of death, then by withholding them from Bowser, I may as well be driving a gates glidden into his heart.

Larry is cognitively developed enough to remember this event. Given time, he will wonder, and in due time he will know. Is it worthwhile to shatter the trust I have so carefully cultivated in him, so rightfully earned? This innocence will not last forever. Heartbroken at a tender age, he may grow into a treacherous backstabber, bent on seeing to it that I pay for this.

Oh, but I could easily, so very easily nip that in the bud. Even right now. My claws tighten around the syringe. I could very indelicately drive this needle into the wrong blood vessel, push the air through it hard enough to inflict an embolism, and watch as Larry convulses, the spreading hæmatoma blackening his skin, on his way down to his final resting spot at the morgue on the bottom floor. Easy as _Apfelstrudel. _There is nothing to stop me from doing just that.

And yet, there is...

I could have very easily elected to withhold the use of my genius and allowed Larry to die of the illness he was born with. I could have done away with the entire wretched family - children, wives and all. Roy got lucky, but I could have been craftier and come up with a plot to not only poison them all, but ensure that Kamek would be convinced beyond reasonable doubt that it was his own doing.

And yet, I had not.

But why not? Have I not foregone the more sensible and rewarding route? What is it that is standing in my way?

Almost as if to answer, my mind drifts into reminiscing a particular moment back when I was living with my family in _Wien_, when I was having a discussion with _Mutter_. It is as if I am right there again... white walls, white carpet, white upholstery; tall bright windows with a view of the cobblestones and lampposts of our gated community on the outside; the smell of _Kaffee_ brewing, desserts baking, and rosy potpourri in a crystal bowl shaped like a swan on the glass coffee table. I generally try to repress these flashbacks, as the word "nostalgia" has an "-algia" in it for a reason - the nostalgia comes in a wave that nearly takes my breath away.

"_Mutter_, when is _Onkel _going to be back?" I asked, pulling a monogrammed handkerchief out of the pocket of the itchy and stuffy but very fetching suit that _Mutter _made wear.

"He will be back, _mein Liebe_, he just needs to... spend a little time at the hospital to get better." She was stroking my hair as I sat in her lap on the sofa. "His brain is just a little more sick than usual right now, and it's a little more at the moment than we here at home can handle."

That _Onkel_ was ill in the head at that time was obvious; he had nearly set the house on fire over a disagreement he had been having with the piano, which his paranoid mind often casts as an animate object.

"_Mutter_... why is it that I suspect that one of these days, you and _Großvater_ and _Großmutter_ are going to send him there to stay and never bring him back?"

"Oh Ludwig, just because they sometimes threaten to lock him up there for good does not mean they mean it. While it would be more... convenient for us if we did not have to deal with _Onkel_'s... quirks, that would not be a very good deal for _Onkel_, now, would it? What do you think he would do if he had to live at a hospital forever and had no freedom, no laboratory of his own, no outlet for his brilliant mind, no friends, no family to care about him?"

"He would... I think his brain-sickness would become even worse."

"That's right. He is part of our _Familie_, and we love him very much, and he loves us very much. We would never abandon him or make him leave unless it was in his very best interest. If we had to let go of a member of our family, it would not be because that was what I wanted... it would be one of the hardest decisions I would ever have to make."

I vividly recall her playing with my hand at that moment, squeezing it firmly, rubbing her thumb over the back, entwining her fingers in mine, resisting my subtle efforts to pull free...

And then this bittersweet daydream comes to an end. It is all somewhat clearer now. Could it be that I actually feel something... something akin to... _love _for these Hell-spawned relatives?

The children are still young, and very malleable. They can grow into loving family members if they are brought up well, as I had been. At least while under my _Mutter_'s care. I am still young as well, her rearing has not been completely undone yet, as will happen if Bowser continues to be the lord of our dysfunctional home. It is too late for him. He is ill-mannered, ill-educated, and inept as a parent, as a ruler, as a husband, and as a reptilian being.

But he is still capable of love. He may have done nothing to deserve mine, but come to think of it, neither have I done anything to deserve his. And yet he loved me before my egg was even laid. He had even exercised some restraint in choosing the mother of his heir - there was certainly no finer candidate than my own...

_Your father really does love you, you know. He loves you much more than you will ever know... _The non-voice of meaning in my mind echoes this, but it does not sound like my own... it must be Kamek's. It does seem like something he would say, one of the many things he would say after I have stopped paying attention.

"Ludwig?" Larry snaps me out of my mental soliloquy, gently tugging at my fingers.

I take a deep breath. I am truly of unsound mind for doing what I am about to do...

The syringe could use further sterilization, just to be on the safe side. I pick up the Fire Flower, hold the needle in front of it, and blow into the flower. Unlike a normal fire, a Fire Flower will flare up more instead of less when carbon dioxide is blown into it, due to a catalytic reaction that favors the reduction of excess concentrations of carbon dioxide by the magnesium in the Fire Flower's unique species of chlorophyll molecules - in philistine-speak, it burns on carbon dioxide instead of oxygen. The fire heats the needle almost to a glowing red.

I uncork the vial of nanobot fluid and place the syringe in to fill it up, every last drop. I cover my nose and draw closer.

In case I fail - I won't, and it will not register in his mind anyway - I lean in to his ear and whisper, almost hesitant, but by now, after much reasoning, almost certain of the sincerity of this statement:

"I... love you... King Dad."

I scrutinize his features, searching for an ideal spot to insert the needle; safe, yet amply circulated. I sigh, knowing that I will regret doing this time and time again, His Majesty will make sure of it.

But not as dearly as I would regret not doing this.


End file.
